Entries by category: Women

The Family Violence Act which commences on 7 June 2012, is an Act aimed at giving priority to the safety and protection of children in family matters that heard by the court. It widens the definition of ‘family violence’ to include actions such as stalking, repeated derogatory taunts, intentionally causing death or injury to an animal, withholding living expenses and preventing family members from seeing their friends or other family members.

We have discussed this Act in earlier blogs when it was a Bill, see:

• Family violence Bill, 12 September 2011
• Put safety first in family law, 19 April 2011.

The new Act's formal name is the Family Law Legislation Amendment (Family Violence and Other Measures) Act 2011 and it amends the Family Law Act 1975.

The Attorney-General's website gives background on the new Act and has a page on Family Violence FAQs.

The Sydney Morning Herald produced two articles on 3 June 2012 which refer to this legislation:

• 'Safety of the child must be put first,' by Nicola Roxon, Attorney-General of Australia
• 'Net widens on family violence', by Stephanie Peatling.

The voices of children in family law cases, Law Report, ABC Radio National on 26 June 2012. An interesting session that discusses the participation of children in family law cases. Listen or read online, or download audio. 

Women are still earning a lot less than men, in fact 17.4% less, according to figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency (EOWA) has calculated the gender pay gap based on the average weekly earnings for men and women. Read their media release on these latest figures.

The average weekly earnings of women were $1186.90, while the average earnings of  men were $1437.40. That’s a gap of $250.50 per week.

See the latest Gender Pay Gap Fact Sheet for more statistics and analysis.

The NSW Government is proposing to introduce a licensing system for brothels.  A recent SMH article quoted a Government spokesperson:

The Government is currently developing options for the delivery of its commitment to close down illegal brothels and properly regulate approved operations through the creation of a Brothel Licensing Authority, and will progress these matters in the near future.

('Licensing law to tighten screws on brothel chiefs' by Tom Reilly & Anne Davies, SMH, 11 October 2011.)

'Regulation of brothels: an update' by Lenny Roth, NSW Parliamentary Research Library, e-brief 15/2011, November 2011 provides a background to the present laws in NSW governing brothels and outlines the new licensing system to replace this present system.

An earlier blog post 'sex slavery' outlines the existence of brothels in Australia where women have been brought into Australia to work as 'sex slaves'.

You could explore this issue as a human rights or criminal justice issue.  You will find the following magazine articles via AGIS Plus if you have a library card for the State Library:

• 'Governing prostitution: differentiating the bad from the bad'  by John Scott (2011) 23 (1) Current issues in Criminal Justice 53-72;
• 'R v Tang: clarifying the definition of "slavery" in international law' by Jean Allain (2009) 10 (1) Melbourne Journal of International Law 246-257; and
• 'Sex in the dark the Brothels legislation Amendment Act 2007 (NSW)' by Penny Crofts (2007) 19 (2) Current Issues in Criminal Justice 183-196.

You will find other articles by typing in 'prostitution' or 'brothels'.

One of the biggest difficulties for victims of domestic violence is to end the violence permanently.  Some women and children move inter-state to avoid contact with the perpetrator.  At present domestic violence is covered by different state-based legislation and an AVO made in NSW is only enforceable in NSW.

The Federal Attorney-General has announced a plan that might change the current situation.  All state and territory police Ministers have agreed to support a new nationally coordinated scheme for domestic and family violence orders (DVOs).  This will allow a person who is protected by a DVO to move across state and territory borders and remain covered.  See media release  11 November 2011.

Draft legislation is to be considered by the Standing Council on Law and Justice later this month.  If this legislation is introduced and passed, it will have been achieved as a result of the National Plan to Reduce Violence against Women and their Children.

The National Plan sets out a framework for action over the next 12 years. It brings together the efforts of governments across the nation to make a real and sustained reduction in the levels of violence against women.

It is the first plan to:

•  coordinate action across jurisdictions.
• focus strongly on prevention.
• look to the long term, building respectful relationships and working to increase gender equality to prevent violence from occurring in the first place.
• focus on holding perpetrators accountable and encourage behaviour change.

This plan shows Australia’s commitments to upholding the human rights of Australian women through the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, the Declaration to End Violence Against Women and the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action.

If you are interested in exploring domestic violence as a criminal justice issue, you might want to look at these resources:

• Domestic violence, Hot Topics 66 (PDF 1702kb) Legal Information Access Centre (LIAC), 2008;
• Domestic violence, Chapter 21, The Law Handbook 11th ed, Thomson Reuters, 2009. Covers practical help and assistance, women's refuges, legal remedies, criminal charges, ADVOs and APVOs;
• Domestic violence in NSW by Talina Drabsch, NSW Parliamentary briefing paper 7/2007;
• Trends and patterns in domestic violence: 2001 to 2010 by Katrina Grech and Melissa Burgess, NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, Issues paper 61, May 2011 and
• Previous domestic violence posts on our blog.

ABC Four Corners and Fairfax Media have been investigating the prevalence of sexual slavery in Australia.  If you are interested in exploring this issue as a Human Rights issue, you might want to see:

• 'Sex slavery' by Sally Neighbour and Peter Cronau, ABC Four Corners, 10 October 2011;
• 'Legal brothels linked to international sex trafficking rings' by Nick McKenzie, Maris Beck, Tom Reilly and Anne Davies, SMH, 10 October 2011;
• 'Licensing law to tighten screws on brothel chiefs' by Tom Reilly and Anne Davies, SMH, 11 October 2011;
•  'The mentality of sexual slavery' SMH - Editorial, 10 October 2011 - note, you need to scroll down to the second part of this editorial to find this piece; and
• 'Sex traffickers exploiting women and law, as State fails to act' by Kelly Hinton, SMH, 11 October 2011.

Fairfax Media have produced the following multimedia presentations:

• The brothels
• Global trafficking

For additional information on this topic, see our earlier blog posts.