Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth has dropped the inaugural Family Domestic and Sexual Violence Commissioner the day before she was due to start the job but will allow her to apply for the role in a new, transparent recruitment process.
The previous government appointed former banking executive Catherine Fitzpatrick to the role two days before the election was called, surprising many in the sector who weren’t aware recruitment was in train.
Catherine Fitzpatrick was appointed the inaugural National Domestic, Family, and Sexual Violence Commissioner.Credit:
She was due to start the five-year job on July 1.
Rishworth said the important role of the commissioner in the new national plan to end violence against women and holding governments to account meant it was vital to select them in a transparent way.
“This decision is not about Ms Fitzpatrick but about the importance of undertaking an open, competitive process, a process the government believes is critical to the success of the inaugural commissioner,” she said.
Fitzpatrick is a former banking executive who drove initiatives at Commonwealth Bank and Westpac to crack down on financial abuse and domestic violence. She has been on the advisory group developing the new national plan as well as a corporate group advising the NSW government. Before entering the corporate world, Fitzpatrick was a media adviser to Howard government ministers Daryl Williams and Robert Hill.
The minister has made it clear to Fitzpatrick she is welcome to apply through the new process. She will also retain her role on the national plan advisory group.
The commission will still be established on Friday as planned and a senior public servant will be made the interim commissioner. Rishworth hopes to fill the role permanently as soon as possible.
The next 10-year overarching national plan was also supposed to be in place for July 1 but it will now be a couple of months before it is ready.
However, members of the national plan advisory group say the minister has given them assurances the delay will not result in any funding cliff for services.
“Services won’t be unfunded come Friday. Anything that was funded under the previous national plan, the fourth action plan will continue as originally they were contracted for,” National Women’s Safety Alliance chief executive Renee Hamilton said.
Across the sector, the widely held view is it’s better to take a bit longer to finalise the plan and get it right.
Full Stop Australia chief executive Hayley Foster said it was clearly a priority to get the new plan in place but it needed more specific targets to measure progress, not just a broad measure of the prevalence of reported domestic violence.
“We anticipate there may indeed be an increase in prevalence in some ways, and that shouldn’t necessarily be seen as a bad thing,” she said.
She’s more interested to see changes in community attitudes and tracking of people’s actual experiences of violence and abuse in their relationships and the support available to them.
No To Violence spokeswoman Joanne Yates said the key measure of number of women murdered by their partners or ex-partners “remains an absolutely stubborn and horrendous statistic” and to make improvements there had to be an evidence base and targets at a lower level that were ambitious but workable.
Louise Simms, an executive director of Victorian peak body Safe and Equal, wants to see the plan clearly articulate the roles and responsibilities of each level of government, leading to concrete actions and targets.
“We didn’t see this in the consultation draft released earlier this year, and we’d prefer the new government takes some time to get it right rather than rushing to get something out to meet a deadline,” she said.
Rishworth and Assistant Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence Justine Elliot are expected to meet with their state and territory counterparts in July to discuss the new plan.
Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732).
Most Viewed in Politics
From our partners
Source: Read Full Article
