Fair Agenda

Today, gender equality campaigning movement Fair Agenda launches a one-stop shop for voters on women’s safety this election, with 200+ candidates already committed to take some action. 

65 candidates, including high profile independent community candidates Nicollete Boele, Kylea Tink, Kim Rubenstein and sitting parliamentarians Andrew Wilkie and Peter Whish-Wilson have fully taken the Pledge for a Safer Future, and made explicit commitments to the transformative change needed to end gender-based violence.

Fair Agenda’s Executive Director Renee Carr, says:

“Going into this election, people want to know that the politicians they elect will take action to stop violence against women. A hundred thousand of us marched for justice during the last parliament; we’re taking those same concerns to the ballot box. 

“We deserve a parliament that will prioritise our safety. Advocates have been calling for transformative change for years. Solutions exist: the pledge shows which candidates are willing to commit to what’s needed.”

“Everyone who cares about women’s safety should ask, have my candidates taken the pledge? Are they willing to do what’s needed to create a safer future?”

The Pledge for a Safer Future contains six specific commitments, and is endorsed by Rosie Batty AO and a range of organisations including the National Association of Services Against Sexual Assault, Australian Women’s Health Network, Australian Women Against Violence Alliance, Women With Disabilitiies Australia and Change the Record.

Former Australian of the Year Rosie Batty AO says:

“It’s now more important than ever that our politicians act for our safety. Solutions exist, experts have laid them out - we need everyone standing for the next parliament to make meaningful, transformative action a priority.“

The Vote For Safety website includes information about parties’ track records in the last parliament; as well as their commitments to future action. The analysis notes the alarming record of the Coalition on systems reform - highlighting the Morrison Government’s abolition of the Family Court, decision to proceed with a parliamentary inquiry into family law opposed by safety advocates; and decision to shelve a taskforce to address sexual violence at universities. 

“We need leadership on women’s safety. That means: strengthening prevention efforts, properly funding services, reforming systems that harm survivors, championing safer workplaces, and doing what it takes to end gender-based violence.” Ms Carr said.

“We all want to be safe at school or university. We all want our workplace to look out for our safety. We all want a friend or loved-one who needs service support to be able to live safely, recover from trauma, and access specialist and timely support. The next parliament has the ability to unlock that future - but we must demand it of them.” Ms Carr said.

The website also collates a list of allegations of gendered misconduct against MPs in the last parliament, which Fair Agenda says highlight the need to prioritise implementation of the Sex Discrimination Commissioner’s Set the Standard recommendations.

“Australians deserve a proper process that ensures all allegations of gendered misconduct by parliamentarians are put through a consistent, independent process. We need a system that holds our parliamentarians to a standard befitting their office and the responsibility they have over our lives and communities - including the national epidemic of gender-based violence.” Ms Carr added.

The website will be live from 9am Thursday at: https://www.voteforsafety.com.au/

In the lead up to the Women's Safety Summit in September 2021, Fair Agenda joined with a group of peak bodies, advocates and leading organisations representing and working in specialist family, domestic and sexual violence services - to highlight core priorities for the next National Plan.

The group urged the Taskforce on Women's Safety to ensure 12 recommendations were incorporated into the next National Plan:

1. Expanded support for primary prevention, with an evidence-based, whole of community approach
2. New, specific investment in early intervention as a priority
3. Increased and longer-term investment in tertiary victim support services
4. Significantly expanded focus on sexual violence
5. Shifting the disproportionate burden from victim survivor to people using violence
6. Recognising children and young people as victims in their own rights
7. Greater research to support evidence-based interventions
8. Reform to ensure a safe and effective family law framework
9. Prioritising initiatives led by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities
10. Recognition that everyone has different life experiences and backgrounds and require different responses
11. Expansion of victim survivor choice and control through appropriate pathways for support, intervention and accountability
12. Strengthened workforce supported by sustainable funding arrangements.

You can read the letter and 12 priority asks it highlighted, here.

Fair Agenda and End Rape on Campus Australia are extremely concerned that the Morrison Government’s Good Society website is still littered with harmful and inaccurate content.

We are deeply worried about the distress and harm this content is likely causing to rape survivors; and that it may be promoting confusion and misconceptions in young people who have been calling out for proper consent education.

Specific content that we are concerned about, and urge the Department to remove from the website immediately, includes:

• Materials that list ‘eye contact’, ‘smiling with the eyes’ or ‘laughing’ as ‘cues that can convey a yes’
• Conflicting materials about non-verbal communication that state ‘looking away’ or ‘going still’ indicates a ‘hard no’ and mean ‘don’t ask again’, and then later stating that ‘stillness’ or ‘looking away’ are body language that is ‘unsure’ (This is particularly concerning when freezing is a common response to rape),
• Materials that create a concerning lack of clarity around consent, with statements like: “we need to avoid pressure and coercion, though respectful persuasion can be okay” and “If a yes is not enthusiastic then it’s a maybe, even a no”. “We also have a responsibility to stop whenever the other person says no or isn’t an enthusiastic yes.” “To leave the Maybe Zone, you either need to both agree yes, or someone needs to finally decide no.”
• Yet another bizarre and problematic video metaphor about a boy not wanting to watch a movie because “I just really hate seeing little children get murdered by clowns” [Movie section of the playlist], and then apologising for not speaking up about wanting to stop.
• Concerning content about relationship break ups, that introduce qualifiers around a person’s ability to end a relationship, like: “strictly speaking, if one person wants to leave a relationship, the other person can’t stop them” and “strictly speaking, as soon as Abby says no to the relationship, that’s the end of it--she can walk away, and Euan has to respect her decision.”
• Concerning messages like ‘sexual desire… can really distort our thinking’
• Provides incorrect and inadequate information about abuse including a page that directs young people to contact the police if they’re being stalked, but doesn’t provide that direction for any other criminal act described, including sexual assault.
• Confusing metaphors about sexual consent including about eating a taco.

The suggestion that stillness and looking away should be seen as anything other than a no; or that smiling or laughing should be seen as a yes are horrifying. The suggestion that these actions could be seen or justified as amounting to consent is incredibly distressing and traumatising. Think of how many young women laugh and smile to try and navigate unsafe situations or inappropriate behaviour.

The safety and trauma of survivors should be a central consideration at the centre of every program. Right now this website is actively harmful. Every single piece of content the government is putting in front of young people on this issue should be signed off by experts who actually understand the drivers of sexual violence, and the need for a trauma-informed approach for the students in these classrooms who have already been sexually assaulted.

We are extremely concerned that promoting the current website does more harm than good.

We urge the Government to take down the website while it is reviewed by experts in violence prevention and comprehensive sexuality and relationships education. And to resource experts to build the capacity of educators to deliver effective content and prevention initiatives in schools.

We should all be safe to live, work and learn free from violence.

But for too long, a culture of male entitlement, gender inequality and disrespect has enabled men to perpetrate horrific gendered violence against women and girls across their life span. And for many, this injustice is compounded by intersecting discriminations. 

Young women’s recent brave advocacy for a safer future has focused national attention on the urgent need for systemic action. Brittany Higgins has come forward with an allegation that she was raped in Parliament House. Friends of a woman who has now died have spoken out about rape allegations against our country’s Attorney-General. Dhanya Mani has spoken up for a safer future and prioritising survivors after the woeful response to her allegation of indecent assault. Chanel Contos has called out rape culture in schools. Australian of the Year, Grace Tame, has spoken out about coverup culture and abuse of power. 

Every single day survivors disclose violence to a system that doesn’t care enough to bring them justice. 

Enough is enough.

Rape and other acts of gendered violence have profound, life-long consequences for survivors, often including physical disabilities and mental health conditions. Yet our prevention infrastructure and support services are not resourced to adequately support survivors’ safety. And systems too often fail to hold perpetrators to account. 

We deserve better. 

Our parliamentary leaders must treat all forms of gendered violence as seriously as other threats to community safety.

Political leaders must take decisive action to make parliaments a safe place for everyone. Including improving the rules governing political staffers and party members to prevent abuse, addressing inequality, providing accessible independent reporting avenues, and ensuring real accountability for misconduct. But action in this moment must extend beyond our parliaments. 

There is also a crisis in our communities. Horrific violence is being perpetrated and enabled across the country - the result of a wider cultural and systemic problem that manifests in schools, workplaces, institutions and homes. For many, these drivers of violence are further enabled by intersecting power dynamics that increase barriers to a safer future. For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women, resisting the ongoing impacts of colonisation and racism is inseparable from gender justice. Intersecting systems of power and oppression also increase barriers to safety for women from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, women with disabilities, younger women, older women, women in institutional care, women in prison, women in insecure work, and trans and gender diverse people as they strive for safety and justice. Too often, impunity is the outcome. 

It is the responsibility of governments to intervene in the systems that continue to enable violence. Survivors and community leaders are already working for a safer future - it’s time governments properly supported solutions, particularly the leadership and self-determination of First Nations communities. 

There are clear pathways to a safer future. We demand the action from leaders needed to make it happen. 

This must also include:

Prevention: Implement the full spectrum of long-term systemic prevention initiatives that can address the underlying causes of gendered violence, including sexism and intersecting forms of discrimination. Starting with comprehensive whole-of-school education programs. 

Resourcing services and accountability mechanisms: Properly resource the specialist services that victim-survivors of gendered violence rely on to report, be safe and recover. Resource the mechanisms needed to hold perpetrators to account. 

Law reform: Improve access to justice for victim-survivors of sexual assault through substantive and procedural law reform, and educate the workforce so responses are appropriate and trauma-informed. 

Addressing workplace sexual harassment: Action all recommendations of last year’s Respect@Work: Sexual Harassment National Inquiry Report.

Anything else falls short, and is a decision to leave women in danger. 

We must believe, support and listen to survivors, hold perpetrators accountable, and properly resource solutions to prevent gendered violence from occurring in the first place. 

Signed,

Fair Agenda
Equality Rights Alliance
Australian Women Against Violence Alliance
Harmony Alliance: Migrant and Refugee Women for Change
NATSIWA
WESNET
Rape & Domestic Violence Services Australia
Rape & Sexual Assault Research & Advocacy
End Rape on Campus Australia
Australian Women’s Health Network
Women with Disabilities Australia
WIRE Women's Information Referral Exchange
Democracy in Colour
Public Health Association of Australia
YWCA Australia
No To Violence
Change the Record
National Foundation for Australian Women (NFAW)
National Council of Single Mothers & their Children Inc
Australian Centre for Leadership for Women (ACLW)
Violence Prevention Australia
Women’s Community Shelters
Australian Lawyers for Human Rights
Marie Stopes Australia
Centre for Non-Violence
50/50 by 2030 Foundation
Australian Women Lawyers Ltd.
Emerge Women and Children’s Support Network
Amnesty International
Foundation for Young Australians
GetUp!
Rationalist Society of Australia
Femflix
350 Australia
Domestic Violence NSW 
Domestic Violence Victoria
Domestic Violence Resource Centre Victoria
Women’s Safety NSW
Women’s Legal Service NSW
Sexual Assault Services Victoria
Women’s Health East
SHINE SA
Women’s Health In the North 
Embolden SA Inc
Women’s Health West
Women’s Health East
Working Women's Centre SA Inc
Sydney Women’s Counselling Centre
Our Choice WA
Women’s Health Loddon Mallee
South Australian Abortion Action Coalition (saaac)
Gippsland Women’s Health
NCJWA Vic
Women's Health Queensland
Women's Health Barwon South West Inc.
Women's Health Victoria
Centre against Domestic Abuse
The Sexual Assault & Family Violence Centre (The SAFV Centre)
Share & Care Community Services Group Inc.
Women with Disabilities Victoria
Ending Violence Against Women Queensland
Children by Choice
Zonta International District 22 Ltd (Queensland and Northern New South Wales)
SCALES Community Legal Centre
Older Women's Network NSW Inc
Warrina Domestic and Family Violence Speacialist Services
Doris Women’s Refuge Inc. (ACT)
The Deli Women & Children's Centre
Women's Lawyers Association of South Australia
Maternal Health Matters Inc
Women in Poverty
Women's Justice Movement NSW
AEU (SA Branch)

Add your organisation's support to the joint statement by contacting Fair Agenda via: [email protected]

You can support the campaign as an individual at: https://www.fairagenda.org/join

More information on asks (click to view)

Here’s what you need to know:

We must protect a patient's access to unbiased healthcare and information

The amendment: remove transfer of care or information requirements where a health professional ‘conscientiously objects’ to providing care

Why this amendment is harmful: A patient’s ability to access the care they urgently need shouldn’t be contingent on the personal beliefs of their health practitioner. For many patients, a rejection by a health practitioner without referral or information will be a major obstacle to their care. 

The provision in the current bill ensures patients are provided with info on where they can access care. The proposed amendment would remove the requirement for a doctor who opposes providing abortion care to tell the patient where they can get unbiased advice or assistance.

Imagine being a young girl in a rural area, having your doctor refuse to talk to you about the abortion you need, and not knowing where else you can get the help you need.

We need to ensure a compassionate model for care in the complex and distressing circumstances where a patient needs abortion care later in pregnancy 

The amendment: would limit the legal grounds for accessing abortion care after 22 weeks 6 days to only life-threatening situations, or cases of feotal anomalies incompatible with survival.

Why this amendment is harmful: The patients and families who need abortion care after this point in pregnancy are facing a range of deeply personal, difficult and distressing circumstances, which can vary significantly. They may be a child or person with disability who has been raped or sexually abused and has been too traumatised to seek help immediately, or by a carer or family member who has obstructed their access to care; or be a victim-survivor of domestic abuse whose access to early care has been obstructed by an abuser trying to trap them in the violent relationship.

This would condemn child victims of sexual abuse, incest and rape who are too traumatised to seek and receive care before the deadline to continue a pregnancy; or leave them only able to fund travel interstate to access care.

The very small proportion of patients whose circumstances lead to needing care after this point deserve compassionate responses, not further obstacles to accessing care they need. Doctors and other health professionals - not politicians - are best placed to assess the needs of each patient, day-by-day and case-by-case.

We must support all community members’ ability to access the abortion care they need without vilification or discrimination

The amendment: a ban on sex-selective abortion that punishes doctors who provide abortion sought on sex-selective grounds

Why this amendment is harmful: In practice, any ban that attempts to ban sex-selective abortion would create an expectation that medical professionals interrogate a patient’s reasons for needing abortion care in order to try and rule out sex-selection. Such a requirement would inevitably lead to profiling of patients from migrant communities and communities of colour; complicating care for those who need it.

The SA Law Reform Institute found that ‘There appears little, if any, evidence that abortions purely on the basis of gender are a real issue in Australia’. So rather than addressing discrimination, any attempt to ban sex-selective abortion is more likely to facilitate it.

As Democracy in Colour have written: “Many migrant communities and communities of colour already experience reduced access to healthcare and treatment outcomes, and we fear such an amendment risks amplifying racial profiling and discrimination in our healthcare system”.

We must trust patients to make their own healthcare decisions 

The amendment: introducing a requirement for health practitioners to provide every patient with information on counselling 

Why this amendment is harmful: Everyone must have the right to make decisions about their bodies without interference, including whether to seek counselling. Mandating counselling or making abortion conditional on an offer of counselling assumes that the patient does not have the capacity to make their own decisions about their health care.

There is no registration category for counsellors, nor is there a legal code of ethics and conduct against which the industry is governed. Some pregnancy-counselling services in Australia have previously been accused of misleading patients and promoting information that is incorrect or biased around abortion. This amendment would open the door for referrals to such biased counselling services, which may serve to delay access to abortion care - particularly for young and vulnerable patients who may believe counselling is mandatory in order to access the abortion care they need. 

Research shows that the majority of women who seek an abortion have already considered their decision at length and have discussed it with their friends and family, and, the majority of women who experience an unintended pregnancy do not wish to speak to a counsellor before deciding how to proceed. In fact, research from Women’s Health West, noting the personal experience of counselling in a mandatory setting in Victoria said “we found that compulsory counselling not only reinforced a lack of control, it sparked anger among women that they were assumed to be incapable of making a considered decision".

Fair Agenda supports the availability of independent, and unbiased counselling to those who request it - and such advice, support and counselling (if needed) are routinely provided to patients within the normal health care process. Referral for specialised counselling is offered when it is appropriate. 

We must protect compassionate palliative care for families who need it

The amendment: Would require medical professionals to intervene and try to ‘preserve the life of the baby’ where abortion care is provided after 23 weeks in pregnancy (unless there are serious anomalies or health issues with the pregnancy). 

Why this amendment is harmful: Patients and families can need abortion care later in pregnancy for a range of complex, distressing, and deeply personal reasons. A woman may have been diagnosed with cancer and need to end her pregnancy early in order to access appropriate treatment. 

Often, when a pregnancy needs to be ended early, families want to spend some precious minutes or hours holding their baby before it passes. In those circumstances, the medical team will induce labour, and families have a chance to hold their baby, while pain relief and palliative care are provided.

If this amendment was passed, medical teams would be required to intervene even if the baby had no chance of long term survival; potentially reducing the time a family can spend holding them before they pass. 

It is deeply offensive to the medical teams involved to suggest they aren’t already providing appropriate care in these circumstances.

We must ensure the accessibility of abortion services outside of cities

The Amendment: Would limit provision of surgical abortion care to incorporated hospitals except in emergencies.

Why this amendment must be opposed: Someone who needs to end a pregnancy should be able to access the care they need from an appropriate health practitioner, at any appropriately certified health facility.

Surgical abortion care is routinely provided at private clinics in other states, and such clinics enable patients to access surgical care closer to home. Parliament shouldn't entrench arbitrary limitations on where that care can be provided. 

Right now, surgical abortions in South Australia are provided in hospitals. But this law could lock in a requirement that is superceded by advances in medical techniques. Under health law sets, and constantly updates, this sort of requirement. But abortion law can last more than 50 years - it needs to be future-proofed.

Ensure patients retain decision-making authority on donations to medical research

The Amendment: Would seek to prohibit any contract or sale of fetal tissue after abortion care.

Why this is harmful: As with other situations of tissue and organ donation, a patient or family who has needed to end a pregnancy may take comfort in knowing that a donation of tissue could help others (for example towards medical research). The patient or family should have the right to make that decision in their circumstances. But the current wording of this amendment would likely operate to ban any such arrangement.

We must ensure the Bill is inclusive of everyone who needs abortion care 

The Amendment: limiting language of the Bill from applying to people to applying to women 

Why this amendment should be opposed: Safe, legal and compassionate access to abortion care should be available to everyone that needs it; and everyone should have the dignity to legally make decisions about their own body and healthcare.

Discriminatory healthcare policies that seek to diminish the capacity of any person in South Australia to control their healthcare decisions should be addressed, not embedded, within this reform.

No one should be denied reproductive autonomy or forced to carry a pregnancy against their will. Everyone, including trans, gender diverse and non-binary people, who needs access to abortion care should be included in this important reform.