The Centre has called for a Second Action Plan that treats children’s safety and recovery as a mandatory consideration in funding decisions, not an add-on to services designed around adult victim-survivors.
The Centre’s submission to inform Australia’s Second Action Plan to End Violence Against Women and Children (2027-2032) highlights how the safety and recovery of children is central to improving the gaps in support created by a decade of family violence reform.
This means recognising therapeutic recovery as core, ongoing infrastructure rather than a time-limited pilots, funding child and family services for the soft entry and early intervention role they already play, and legislating children’s status as victim survivors in their own right, including named entitlements in family violence intervention orders and family law processes.
The submission draws on the reported experience of the Centre’s member organisations, sector data, and the Centre’s own analysis of current service system, and makes five overarching recommendations, comprising of 19 actions, for the Australian Government’s consideration:
- Recognise victim-survivor recovery as core, ongoing infrastructure
- Protect and expand prevention and early intervention
- Recognise children and young people as victim-survivors in their own right
- Strengthen accountability for people who use violence
- Treat housing, coordination and workforce as core system infrastructure
Ten years on from the Royal Commission into Family Violence, Victoria’s reforms have produced substantial gains for adult victim-survivors, however, children continue to be treated by services, courts, and funding models as dependents of an adult victim-survivor rather than as victim-survivors with recovery needs, risks and rights of their own. The Centre’s submission argues that improving support for children and young people starts with recognising child and family services as critical infrastructure, not only as an option on the margins of an already stretched system.
This is a call the Centre is also taking into the upcoming Victorian State Election. Access to therapeutic recovery support for children is one of the priorities in our election platform, which sets out what the next Victorian Government needs to do to make children’s safety and recovery a funded reality rather than a stated intention.
The Centre and its members welcome the opportunity to continue working with the Australian Government as the Second Action Plan is finalised and implemented.