Jacquie Petrusma, Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence and Minister for Police, Fire and Emergency Management,
Ensuring victim-survivors of family and sexual violence receive immediate and integrated support in a safe place is a top priority for the Tasmanian Liberal Government.
To provide a best-practice sexual and family violence response that puts victim-survivors at the centre, our Government intends to establish three Multidisciplinary Centres that offer immediate support and safety services to victim-survivors, including counselling, witness intermediaries, police and other related services at the one location.
Importantly, the Multidisciplinary Centres will recognise the intersection between sexual and family violence and this will be embedded into our Government’s response by expanding the capabilities and resourcing of the Safe Families Coordination Unit to include sexual violence more broadly, including child sexual violence.
This year’s Budget will include funding for the establishment of the first of these Multidisciplinary Centres and, subject to the success of the pilot, our Government will look at progressively developing the centres across all regions in the State.
Planning work on this important initiative has commenced and will be developed in conjunction with our Government’s third Family and Sexual Violence Action Plan.
The new Action Plan will further refine and target our efforts, to achieve our goal that every Tasmanian is able to live free from violence.
The Hearing Lived Experience Survey 2022 is now open, and will inform the Action Plan. The Survey will build on our ground-breaking 2018 Survey by including victim-survivors’ lived experience of sexual violence in addition to family violence.
All Tasmanians are encouraged to participate in the Hearing Lived Experience Survey, which is anonymous and is available at www.safefromviolence.tas.gov.au.
If you or someone you know is impacted by family violence, please call the Family Violence Response and Referral Line 24/7 on 1800 633 937.
If you or someone you know is impacted by sexual violence, please call the state-wide Sexual Assault Crisis Line 24/7 on 1800 697 877.
In an emergency, always call 000.
