January 30, 2025 • 24 mins
This is the third episode in our podcast series exploring domestic violence in Australia. We will explore the legal issues people experience, the services available to provide support and speak to a wide range of people working in the sector.
We acknowledge the traditional owners of the lands on which this episode was made and pay our respects to Elders past and present.
In this episode, Pauline from the Community Legal Education branch speaks to Tanya Whitehouse, coordinator of Macarthur Women's Domestic Violence Court Advocacy Service (WDVCAS). They discuss the role of WDVCAS in supporting women affected by domestic violence.
Link to the DVSAT tool via Communities and Justice: Domestic Violence Safety Assessment Tool | Family & Community Services
Links to support services for people experiencing domestic and family violence are below.
- 1800 RESPECT 1800 737 732 – a free and confidential national counselling service for sexual assault and domestic and family violence. 1800respect.org.au
- 1800 656 463 NSW Domestic Violence Line–free, confidential counselling and referrals for women experiencing domestic and family violence.
- 1800 424 017 for anyone who has experienced sexual assault, recently or in the past, also for family members professionals and others impacted.
- 1800 943 539 – 24/7 sexual, domestic and family violence helpline for anyone whose life has been impacted by domestic or family violence.
- 1800 385 578 - Full Stop Australia – provides counselling for people whose lives have been impacted by violence and abuse. fullstop.org.au
- 1800 211 028 – 24/7 for adult survivors of childhood institutional sexual abuse. Helping anyone accessing the Redress scheme or alternative compensation.
- 13 92 76 – 13 YARN – 24/7 support for mob feeling overwhelmed or having difficulty coping. 13yarn.org.au
- Well Mob - wellmob.org.au social, emotional and cultural wellbeing online resources for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
- 1800 497 212 – A free, confidential service available 24/7 for anyone from the LGBTQI+ community whose life has been impacted by sexual, domestic and/or family violence.
- Say it out loud - sayitoutloud.org.au a national service for LGBTQ+ communities and service professionals working with people who have experienced sexual, domestic and/or family violence
- 1300 766 491 – 7 days pw service for anyone in Australia whose life has been impacted by men’s use of violence or abusive behaviours.
Useful websites:
Our Watch | Quick facts about violence against women
Domestic Violence Prevention Centre: support and resources
Family and domestic violence - Services Australia
Music: What a day by bhzimmy
Download the transcript
Please send questions, comments and feedback to cle@legalaid.nsw.gov.au
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Pauline (00:02):
This is the law for community workers podcast series
till the violence ends. Allinformation provided in this
episode is correct at the timeof recording and should be
regarded as information only andnot legal advice. Please see the
timestamps in our show notes fora breakdown of the episode,
along with links to anyresources mentioned throughout.
Legal Aid New South Wales wouldlike to acknowledge that all our
(00:22):
podcasts are recorded onAboriginal lands across New
South Wales. We pay our respectsto all traditional owners and
custodians of those lands, andextend that respect to elders
past and present, and especiallyto any Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander people listeningevery episode, our guests will
continue to shine a communitylight on this most important
topic. These episodes maycontain details of violence, so
(00:43):
listener discretion is stronglyadvised. Our guest this episode
is Tanya Whitehouse, thecoordinator of Macarthur Women's
Domestic Violence Court AdvocacyService.
Hi, Tanya, thank you for joiningus today. It's an absolute
pleasure to have you.
Tanya (00:57):
Hi Pauline, thanks so much for having me.
Pauline (01:00):
So Tanya, would you please tell us a little bit
about your role in the work ofthe WDVCAS service.
Tanya (01:05):
So I'm the manager of Macarthur Women's Domestic
Violence Court Advocacy Service.We're one of 27 I'm just going
to abbreviate it WDVCAS, becauseit's such a long name. I will
state at the beginning thatdomestic violence is mainly
perpetrated by men, but thereare definitely male victims of
domestic and family violence aswell. When I talk today, I'm
going to talk about victims aswomen or people who identify as
(01:29):
female, because that's our corebusiness, and that's what we
know as a specialist service.We're one of 27 across the
state, so basically, the role ofthe women's domestic violence
court Advocacy Service is tosupport those women who have
issues, concerns are going tocourt, specific to the issue of
domestic and family violence. SoI manage a service based in
(01:51):
Macarthur, which is south westSydney we cover Campbelltown,
Camden and Wollondilly LGA's andwe support any women in those
post code areas that have anyissues around domestic violence.
The safer pathway model for theWDVCAS's is one that involves a
significant collaboration with arange of stakeholders. So what
(02:12):
happens with police is, whenthey attend a domestic violence
incident, they will then put herinto a system that goes to a
dashboard, and basically thatWDVCAS gets every referral from
that police area command thatcovers the postcode that that
WDVCAS has, so that'sautomatically sent to them. An
(02:33):
example is that only a couple ofweeks ago, we had 133 referrals
for that week just fromCampbelltown and Camden police
area commands. So there's a lotof busy WDVCAS's everywhere.
Part of the the requirement forthat safer pathway model is that
every WDVCAS has 24 hours tomake a first attempt at contact,
(02:55):
and then we have five days tohave three attempts at contact
to talk to her. Quite often,there's no court matter
associated with that. If thereis an apprehended domestic
violence order and or a DVrelated charge, we will get a
narrative about what the policehave done for that. However, the
majority of our calls could wellbe with no information other
(03:15):
than names and addresses, andthen we make those cold calls
and ask her if she's safe andcontinue that conversation if
she feels that she wants to dothat.
Pauline (03:24):
Okay, you spoke about getting referrals from the
police. So what about externalreferrals? Can other services
refer to your service, and howdoes that work? What's the best
way for that to happen?
Tanya (03:35):
Absolutely. One thing that I would potentially say to
anyone who's listening and theylive wherever they live in New
South Wales, you can actuallyring a 1800 number to be
immediately connected to theWDVCAS that covers your area. So
you ring 1800 W, D, V forVictor, C, A, S for Sam, you put
(03:56):
in it's prompted then to put ina post code, and it connects you
directly with that serviceprovider. That's only during the
week, but there is support onthe weekends with other options.
What I would say is that ifyou're a service provider, or
even you're a family member or afriend and you want to get some
advice or some support aroundwhat your next steps could be to
support that person, or you arethe victim survivor, wanting to
(04:19):
reach out for help, ring thatnumber, and you'll get put
through immediately. The role ofa WDVCAS is it's a domestic
violence specialist service, andthey're able to do anything and
everything that comes withdomestic and family violence. So
we don't just go to court. Wecan do referrals. We can help
you with a safe phone. We canhelp you with gift vouchers, if
(04:41):
we need to. We can do safetyplans. We can help you to get
into accommodation,
Pauline (04:46):
While our series targets case workers, community
workers and support workers forthe benefit of listeners who may
not have the those formaltrainings. Tanya, would you
please explain for our audiencewhat domestic violence is and
what behaviorS are included inthe definition.
Tanya (05:02):
Okay, so domestic violence covers a really broad
range of behaviours. It can bewith an intimate partner, an ex
partner, family member, or itcould be someone who lives in a
group, home situation. Domesticviolence includes behaviors like
mental abuse, physical abuse,financial abuse, sexual abuse,
cultural abuse, psychologicalabuse, stalking or intimidating
(05:26):
behavior, social isolation,geographical isolation, Faith
abuse. And what we tend to findis that these behaviors operate
in more than one context. So alot of our clients will talk
about more than one thinghappening to them.
Pauline (05:42):
So, Tanya, what about the new law of coercive control
and the fact that it'sacknowledged as a part of
domestic and family violence?Can you talk to us a little bit
about coercive control?
Tanya (05:51):
Sure Pauline, so what I will say is that coercive
control has been somethingthat's been around since the
dawn of time. What is reallypositive is it's now recognised
as a criminal offense. There's alot of work to do around that
for workers in the sector interms of being able to identify
that with clients and also bestsupport them to get their
(06:13):
evidence and their conversationsready for the police. So
coercive control is the corebehavior of domestic violence.
It's repeated behaviour, and ithas intent with patterns. So it
could be acts of assault, actsof threats, threats to harm,
threats to punish. They're allbehaviors that have a
(06:34):
consistency with them. So whatthe government has done is
legislated that as an offense,and what we need to be really
careful of too, is that when wetalk about coercive control as
an offense with a client, isthat we make sure that the
information we're gathering withher to help her is only from the
first of july 2024 you can't goback to report something that
(06:57):
happened prior to that date.Unfortunately.
Pauline (06:59):
Okay, okay, all right, that's good to know.
Tanya (07:02):
What I would say, too, to anybody who's wanting to get a
lot more information around thelegal side of coercive control
is to look at the Legal Aidpodcasts on coercive control,
because they're really helpful.They do take a little while, but
they're really good to watch,and you can keep watching them
over and over and take somenotes. So just a little plug for
that, because it's actuallyreally good.
Pauline (07:22):
Well, thank you for that. And also just to let
people know that this series hasan episode that is focusing on
coercive control with two of ourexperienced criminal solicitors,
and that's coming up soon. Whatare some of the other supports
that a CAS can provide
Tanya (07:41):
They can they attend court on the upper head and
domestic violence order listday, which is different days of
the week in different courts,where there is a support
service. So we sometimes pick upwomen that we haven't yet spoken
to. We also support women whoare female defendants at court,
who identify that they've been avictim, survivor of abuse with
that that other party. So we'reable to offer in Macarthur, we
(08:03):
have duty solicitor scheme thatis funded by legal aid. There's
a number of WDVCAS's across thestate that have that, and those
duty solicitors give the freelegal advice and then represent
her in court. For her matter,
Pauline (08:16):
how does WDVCAS interact with other services, as
in the police, courts, health,housing,
Tanya (08:24):
we have to work with everybody. You can't manage the
issue of domestic violence as asole service provider. It just
doesn't work. Never will. So thekey thing here is that we have
so is the DVSAT something thatother services are free to use,
to work collaboratively witheverybody. We have to find ways
of having best practice forsupporting those victim
survivors and their families,and we need to work together
(08:45):
with a goal of that victimsurvivor being safe, whatever
that looks like. We might needto advocate with police. We
might need to advocate withhousing or Centrelink. We might
need to advocate with otherservice providers to say, you
know, this is what we're doing.What are you doing? Let's work
together for that client andhave a client centered, trauma
(09:07):
focused approach. The saferpathway model is very broad in
its context, but there are anumber of things that come with
it. So I've worked withMacarthur WDVCAS for over 32
years, and I have to say that Ithink the safer pathway model is
probably one of the best thatI've ever seen anywhere. It
involves a whole stack of thingsthat I won't go into detail, but
(09:29):
one of the primary things is athing called a SAM meeting. So a
SAM meeting is a safety actionmeeting. They're held every
fortnight across the entirestate by every WD because and
their police area commands,those meetings are for any women
who are assessed under anotherabbreviation called a DVSAT,
which is the domestic violencesafety assessment tool, police
(09:51):
will ask questions to her. Shemay choose to answer some. She
may choose not to answer all ofthem, for a whole lot of
different reasons, when we ringher and have a conversation with
her. We do the DVSAT again, andquite often she'll tell us a lot
more because she feels she's notworried about him getting
charged for something shedoesn't want to say. There's a
(10:13):
whole lot of barriers aroundthat. If she answers yes to 12
or more of the 25 questions,she's escalated to something
called serious threat. Seriousthreat means she is a
participant on the agenda forthe SAM meeting. And the SAM
meeting, when it's held, has awhole bunch of stakeholders that
sit at the table. They all haveto be a manager so they can make
(10:35):
a decision on the spot. And someof the stakeholders, I'll just
in my head, go around the table.So we've got police, WDVCAS,
child protection, housing,education, health, other support
services in our area, example isstaying home leaving violence.
We have the men's supportservice, so male victim
survivors also come to thosemeetings and have their own
(10:56):
advocate. We have corrections,and we have local services that
come local Aboriginal service.And we also have a few other
little services that pop in aswell. If you are a support
service and you do a DVSAT withyour client, which I will say I
would question why you don't aspart of your assessment tool.
Because we need to have a commonlanguage, and the DVSAT is that.
(11:23):
Absolutely! and with that comesa huge bonus of being able to
have her go to the SAM meeting,the worker comes as her
advocate, and she can sit thereand hear what everybody around
the table has to say, becausethe meeting is confidential, so
nothing's minuted around what'sdiscussed. The only things that
are minuted are the actions. Soif she's looking to get an
(11:44):
urgent transfer, then housingwould be a part of that. You'd
the advocate talks to the issueshousing say, well, we will
action this, this and this, andthen in two weeks time, when we
come back, the question isasked, of all of the matters
that have been held previously,they will say, what happened
with this matter? Has this beendone? The best part I love about
(12:04):
the SAM is accountability.Everybody's accountable for what
they say they'll do.
Pauline (12:08):
So there's actually a there is a follow up.
Tanya (12:11):
Yeah and what I would say with the service providers is,
look at the DVSAT. It's not thebe all and end all, but it's
certainly a really key part toassessing risk for domestic
violence, so make it a part ofyour assessment tool. If you're
not, why aren't you? And let'sdo this so that we can make sure
that we have the best outcomeswe can possibly get For
(12:34):
Macarthur in in terms of the SAMmeetings, we've got the largest
Sams that in the state. Ourmeeting goes for about four or
five hours. We have up to 50people on the agenda, and those
matters are consistently doneevery two weeks. So we
understand the risk, weunderstand the role of everyone.
And the stakeholders within ourSam are all there on the same
(12:54):
page. Nobody's there to make ita negative experience for that
victim survivor, our job is tomake sure that she and her
children, if she has children,are safe.
Pauline (13:05):
How many courts are in that area, the South West Sydney
area?
Tanya (13:10):
For our WDVCAS, we only have Campbelltown and Picton
courts. Some other WDVCAS'smight have a lot more,
particularly our rural andregional sister services, they
would have a lot more courts,yeah, and a significant distance
to travel.
Pauline (13:24):
So all of the escalated matters from any of those courts
can end up at a SAM meeting.
Tanya (13:29):
Yes they can and the SAMS are held at different places.
Ours is held at a policestation. They hold them in
different areas around sothey're determined by the police
area command. So, yeah, someWDVCAS's might have two Sam's,
but we only have one.
Pauline (13:47):
so we're going to have the link to the DVSAT on our
show notes for people if theywant to download that for their
file work. So, Tanya, is there atime limit on a woman accessing
your service? And...
Tanya (14:00):
No..
Pauline (14:01):
okay, so they can access multiple times as well?
Tanya (14:04):
Absolutely they can. We've got some clients that
we've had on and off for many,many years. So the way that we
look at it is, if a woman feelsconfident enough to come and
engage with us, it doesn'tmatter how many times she needs
to do that, we want to be thatservice that she feels safe to
go to. She may or may not do thesuggestions and the information
provided, she might make adifferent choice, and that's
(14:26):
fine, but she knows that she'salways got the same space to
come back to as she needs to.
Pauline (14:31):
Excellent, that's really good to know. What are
some of the things that you cantalk to us about, that that
workers and their clients can dotogether to try and make leaving
as safe as possible. It is wellknown amongst workers that it is
the most dangerous time for awoman, or one uou know, one of
the most dangerous times for awoman is when she attempts to
(14:53):
leave. So what is it thatworkers can do together with
clients to try and make that asafe thing to do? Or the safest
possible thing to do.
Tanya (15:01):
The key thing that I I've been probably banging on for
many, many years, is just workcollaboratively. Don't work in a
silo. Put aside your egos. Ifyou work for services where it's
like, oh, we're going to do thisand whatever, whatever. If
you're not going to workcollaboratively, you're not
doing the best that you can forthat client. And what I would
say is, if you've got aeverybody has a WDVCAS. If
(15:24):
you're working with a womanthat's been, for example,
referred to you as an IFPprovider, so you're working with
a family as a whole, you canalways contact your local WDVCAS
and find out if she's workingwith that service as well. And
that way, you inform the client,and you say, hey, you've got
Tanya from Macarthur. WDVCASworking with you, with the AVO
(15:47):
staff, we're going to work withyou with the kids to keep you
safe. Let's just make sure thatyou're clear on who's doing
what, so that women aren'tgetting having to repeat their
story, which is not somethingthat we ever want them to have
to do, and we're all on the samepage the same when we do a
referral to another serviceprovider, if we want to refer
(16:07):
her to another service, we willgive as much information as we
can with her consent, becausethen she doesn't have to retell
that. And that is something thatwe all know gets minimized a
little bit more every time shehas to tell it.
Pauline (16:22):
So is there a flip side to that as well? Like, what's
the best way to support a clientwho stays in the home?
Tanya (16:30):
I think that, you know it varies in different areas. It
really depends what serviceproviders you've got in your
area that can help rememberingthat there are a number of
options. So victim services foran immediate need support
payment, you can apply for moneyto help her get cameras or a
duress alarm, things like that.You can also look locally if
(16:51):
you've got a staying home,leaving violence service, we use
ours all the time, and thebeauty of them is that they do a
home safety audit. So they comeand check out the house. They
know what they're looking for.She may say, I think he's got
cameras here, or I think he'sdone something with my phone.
They can look into all of thatsort of stuff as well. And
having that real model of herbeing as safe as she can so she
(17:16):
doesn't have to move, becausewhy should she, if it's safe
enough for her to stay. Whyshould she have to move? But use
the services that you've got.Another option is also the
escaping violence payment that'savailable, that can also get
things like vouchers or cameras.There are lots of options. If
you're not a service providerthat has a financial brokerage
(17:38):
option in your own funding. Is
Pauline (17:40):
there anything coming up in the DVCAS space that case
workers should keep an eye outfor?
Tanya (17:45):
Look, I think there's always things that are evolving.
What I would say is that youryour local WDVCAS will always
provide that consistent servicesupport around being a DV
specialist service. I do knowthat there is potential to look
at reassessing the DVSAT and thequestions with that, and that's
a work in progress, I would say,to keep in mind too, that
(18:09):
coercive control is such a newthing that I really think
workers really need to do asmuch as they can to be informed
around that and what kind ofresponsibilities they could hold
to support her with that, womenwho might not feel confident to
go to the police, women who'vehad a bad experience with police
before, women who have differentcultural backgrounds that don't
(18:29):
understand the law, women whojust don't want to go to the
police unless they've gotsomeone with them. I think a
really critical part that we allneed to look at is, how are we
supporting her, and how are weensuring that she's well
informed and empowered to makean informed decision, rather
than just saying you can do thisor you can do that?
Pauline (18:50):
So Tanya, can I ask you just a little bit about
specialist roles within theCAS's? Could you tell me a
little bit about those
Tanya (18:57):
sure every women's domestic violence court advocacy
Yeah, fair enough. So we've,we've come to the end. The last
service across the state isfunded for a Aboriginal focus
worker. They're called DFEspecialist workers, Aboriginal
focus every WDVCAS should haveone of those workers. A lot of
other WDVCAS's will also have amulticultural focus worker. What
(19:18):
I have in terms of our keyworkers is we have a number of
DFE specialist workers, but thenwe also have a number of
question I have is, if there'sanything that you could change
caseworkers that have a special,specific area of expertise. So I
have an Aboriginal caseworker, ayouth focused, a disability
focused, a couple of generalistsand an LGBTIQ+ focus caseworker.
(19:40):
So while their core role isworking in those particular
community groups, they will workwith anyone that they need to.
And I think that having thepositions that I've developed
have been specific to the needsof our area. So you may find
about the law in New South Walesand services for victim
that other services may not havespecific roles that we do, but
(20:01):
they would be more focusedtowards what's the needs in
their area, keeping in mind toothat our sister CAS's that are
in rural and regional have verylimited options in terms of
support, so the caseworker maywell be the only person that can
survivors of domestic and familyviolence. What would it be?
work with her, because they havevery little options. Or they've
(20:22):
got waiting lists at other services.
(20:44):
How long have you got? when,when I look at what's on social
media and what's in a whole lotof things is we always hear
about the bad and the negative.I think what we also need to do
is recognize, highlight andsupport the positives that we
see with our local serviceproviders, recognise the hard
(21:05):
work that all the workers inthis sector are doing, recognise
the work that they're doing withsometimes very limited budgets,
and work together. So in change,in terms of the law, I think
that we've got a lot on ourplate at the moment to kind of
digest coercive control and howthat looks, and what we're going
to do to support those victimsurvivors with reporting that,
(21:27):
how we thought, how we alsosupport the police with that
evidence base around thatoffense. I think what we could
do is we could sit down and say,Well, this is bad. This is bad.
This is bad. There's bad inevery sector and every service
provider, whether it's police agovernment department, dv,
workers in general, people arealways going to find negative
(21:50):
experiences. What I wouldsuggest is part of the role that
we all have as advocates is tobe that voice alongside her, to
raise the issues and concerns,but keeping it as a proactive
way of doing it, let's workbetter together. I think one
thing that we do need toconsistently look at for our
(22:10):
space for female victimsurvivors is the primary
aggressor, and how that's seen,particularly at court, when we
end up with women who aredefendants and granted,
sometimes police have no optionsbut to do that because an
offense has occurred, and Iabsolutely recognise that, but I
think that as service providers,we can be that voice in raising
(22:31):
those concerns with those powersthat be, that that she may well
never feel confident tochallenge or not even know what
her rights are around that? Ithink that in terms of service
provision, we've just got towork together like, just do
better. Everybody can do better.We all have positive aspects to
(22:54):
our service provision, but ifwe're not going to work together
with that client centered,trauma informed approach. We're
not doing the job that we shouldbe, and I'll be challenging that
if I have to.
Pauline (23:07):
Yeah excellent.....
Tanya (23:11):
I would say is that you're, if you're a victim,
survivor, or even if you're aservice provider, and you just
look at the sector arounddomestic violence, think I don't
even know where to go, I wouldstrongly say go to your women's
domestic violence court AdvocacyService first. They're the ones
who know the services on theground. They know who's who in
the zoo. They know who's gotwaiting lists. They know who
(23:33):
hasn't at least make that phonecall and see if you can work
together for her. Because havingmore than one service could be
ideal in terms of the serviceprovision that she receives, and
it could also help to make sucha difference to her safety,
because it's not just all on oneservice to do it.
Pauline (23:51):
So thank you so much for joining us today, Tanya,
that has been absolutelywonderful information, and thank
you for sharing the incrediblework that the women's domestic
violence court Advocacy Serviceis doing.
Tanya (24:03):
Thank you. Pleasure to be here and a pleasure to share
that information so that peoplecan work harder and collaborate
more
Pauline (24:10):
Wonderful. This has been till the violence ends,
showcasing the life savingservices addressing gender based
violence every episode until theviolence ends, if you or someone
you know, is being impacted bydomestic violence, please call
the DV hotline on 1800 65 64 63or 1800 RESPECT. That's 1800 73
(24:34):
77 32 or the men's line on 130078 99 78. In any emergency
situation, please call triple O,this has been till the violence
ends. Thank you for listeningand Goodbye, everyone.
This is the law for community workers podcast series
till the violence ends. Allinformation provided in this
episode is correct at the timeof recording and should be
regarded as information only andnot legal advice. Please see the
timestamps in our show notes fora breakdown of the episode,
along with links to anyresources mentioned throughout.
Legal Aid New South Wales wouldlike to acknowledge that all our
(00:22):
podcasts are recorded onAboriginal lands across New
South Wales. We pay our respectsto all traditional owners and
custodians of those lands, andextend that respect to elders
past and present, and especiallyto any Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander people listeningevery episode, our guests will
continue to shine a communitylight on this most important
topic. These episodes maycontain details of violence, so
(00:43):
listener discretion is stronglyadvised. Our guest this episode
is Tanya Whitehouse, thecoordinator of Macarthur Women's
Domestic Violence Court AdvocacyService.
Hi, Tanya, thank you for joiningus today. It's an absolute
pleasure to have you.
Tanya (00:57):
Hi Pauline, thanks so much for having me.
Pauline (01:00):
So Tanya, would you please tell us a little bit
about your role in the work ofthe WDVCAS service.
Tanya (01:05):
So I'm the manager of Macarthur Women's Domestic
Violence Court Advocacy Service.We're one of 27 I'm just going
to abbreviate it WDVCAS, becauseit's such a long name. I will
state at the beginning thatdomestic violence is mainly
perpetrated by men, but thereare definitely male victims of
domestic and family violence aswell. When I talk today, I'm
going to talk about victims aswomen or people who identify as
(01:29):
female, because that's our corebusiness, and that's what we
know as a specialist service.We're one of 27 across the
state, so basically, the role ofthe women's domestic violence
court Advocacy Service is tosupport those women who have
issues, concerns are going tocourt, specific to the issue of
domestic and family violence. SoI manage a service based in
(01:51):
Macarthur, which is south westSydney we cover Campbelltown,
Camden and Wollondilly LGA's andwe support any women in those
post code areas that have anyissues around domestic violence.
The safer pathway model for theWDVCAS's is one that involves a
significant collaboration with arange of stakeholders. So what
(02:12):
happens with police is, whenthey attend a domestic violence
incident, they will then put herinto a system that goes to a
dashboard, and basically thatWDVCAS gets every referral from
that police area command thatcovers the postcode that that
WDVCAS has, so that'sautomatically sent to them. An
(02:33):
example is that only a couple ofweeks ago, we had 133 referrals
for that week just fromCampbelltown and Camden police
area commands. So there's a lotof busy WDVCAS's everywhere.
Part of the the requirement forthat safer pathway model is that
every WDVCAS has 24 hours tomake a first attempt at contact,
(02:55):
and then we have five days tohave three attempts at contact
to talk to her. Quite often,there's no court matter
associated with that. If thereis an apprehended domestic
violence order and or a DVrelated charge, we will get a
narrative about what the policehave done for that. However, the
majority of our calls could wellbe with no information other
(03:15):
than names and addresses, andthen we make those cold calls
and ask her if she's safe andcontinue that conversation if
she feels that she wants to dothat.
Pauline (03:24):
Okay, you spoke about getting referrals from the
police. So what about externalreferrals? Can other services
refer to your service, and howdoes that work? What's the best
way for that to happen?
Tanya (03:35):
Absolutely. One thing that I would potentially say to
anyone who's listening and theylive wherever they live in New
South Wales, you can actuallyring a 1800 number to be
immediately connected to theWDVCAS that covers your area. So
you ring 1800 W, D, V forVictor, C, A, S for Sam, you put
(03:56):
in it's prompted then to put ina post code, and it connects you
directly with that serviceprovider. That's only during the
week, but there is support onthe weekends with other options.
What I would say is that ifyou're a service provider, or
even you're a family member or afriend and you want to get some
advice or some support aroundwhat your next steps could be to
support that person, or you arethe victim survivor, wanting to
(04:19):
reach out for help, ring thatnumber, and you'll get put
through immediately. The role ofa WDVCAS is it's a domestic
violence specialist service, andthey're able to do anything and
everything that comes withdomestic and family violence. So
we don't just go to court. Wecan do referrals. We can help
you with a safe phone. We canhelp you with gift vouchers, if
(04:41):
we need to. We can do safetyplans. We can help you to get
into accommodation,
Pauline (04:46):
While our series targets case workers, community
workers and support workers forthe benefit of listeners who may
not have the those formaltrainings. Tanya, would you
please explain for our audiencewhat domestic violence is and
what behaviorS are included inthe definition.
Tanya (05:02):
Okay, so domestic violence covers a really broad
range of behaviours. It can bewith an intimate partner, an ex
partner, family member, or itcould be someone who lives in a
group, home situation. Domesticviolence includes behaviors like
mental abuse, physical abuse,financial abuse, sexual abuse,
cultural abuse, psychologicalabuse, stalking or intimidating
(05:26):
behavior, social isolation,geographical isolation, Faith
abuse. And what we tend to findis that these behaviors operate
in more than one context. So alot of our clients will talk
about more than one thinghappening to them.
Pauline (05:42):
So, Tanya, what about the new law of coercive control
and the fact that it'sacknowledged as a part of
domestic and family violence?Can you talk to us a little bit
about coercive control?
Tanya (05:51):
Sure Pauline, so what I will say is that coercive
control has been somethingthat's been around since the
dawn of time. What is reallypositive is it's now recognised
as a criminal offense. There's alot of work to do around that
for workers in the sector interms of being able to identify
that with clients and also bestsupport them to get their
(06:13):
evidence and their conversationsready for the police. So
coercive control is the corebehavior of domestic violence.
It's repeated behaviour, and ithas intent with patterns. So it
could be acts of assault, actsof threats, threats to harm,
threats to punish. They're allbehaviors that have a
(06:34):
consistency with them. So whatthe government has done is
legislated that as an offense,and what we need to be really
careful of too, is that when wetalk about coercive control as
an offense with a client, isthat we make sure that the
information we're gathering withher to help her is only from the
first of july 2024 you can't goback to report something that
(06:57):
happened prior to that date.Unfortunately.
Pauline (06:59):
Okay, okay, all right, that's good to know.
Tanya (07:02):
What I would say, too, to anybody who's wanting to get a
lot more information around thelegal side of coercive control
is to look at the Legal Aidpodcasts on coercive control,
because they're really helpful.They do take a little while, but
they're really good to watch,and you can keep watching them
over and over and take somenotes. So just a little plug for
that, because it's actuallyreally good.
Pauline (07:22):
Well, thank you for that. And also just to let
people know that this series hasan episode that is focusing on
coercive control with two of ourexperienced criminal solicitors,
and that's coming up soon. Whatare some of the other supports
that a CAS can provide
Tanya (07:41):
They can they attend court on the upper head and
domestic violence order listday, which is different days of
the week in different courts,where there is a support
service. So we sometimes pick upwomen that we haven't yet spoken
to. We also support women whoare female defendants at court,
who identify that they've been avictim, survivor of abuse with
that that other party. So we'reable to offer in Macarthur, we
(08:03):
have duty solicitor scheme thatis funded by legal aid. There's
a number of WDVCAS's across thestate that have that, and those
duty solicitors give the freelegal advice and then represent
her in court. For her matter,
Pauline (08:16):
how does WDVCAS interact with other services, as
in the police, courts, health,housing,
Tanya (08:24):
we have to work with everybody. You can't manage the
issue of domestic violence as asole service provider. It just
doesn't work. Never will. So thekey thing here is that we have
so is the DVSAT something thatother services are free to use,
to work collaboratively witheverybody. We have to find ways
of having best practice forsupporting those victim
survivors and their families,and we need to work together
(08:45):
with a goal of that victimsurvivor being safe, whatever
that looks like. We might needto advocate with police. We
might need to advocate withhousing or Centrelink. We might
need to advocate with otherservice providers to say, you
know, this is what we're doing.What are you doing? Let's work
together for that client andhave a client centered, trauma
(09:07):
focused approach. The saferpathway model is very broad in
its context, but there are anumber of things that come with
it. So I've worked withMacarthur WDVCAS for over 32
years, and I have to say that Ithink the safer pathway model is
probably one of the best thatI've ever seen anywhere. It
involves a whole stack of thingsthat I won't go into detail, but
(09:29):
one of the primary things is athing called a SAM meeting. So a
SAM meeting is a safety actionmeeting. They're held every
fortnight across the entirestate by every WD because and
their police area commands,those meetings are for any women
who are assessed under anotherabbreviation called a DVSAT,
which is the domestic violencesafety assessment tool, police
(09:51):
will ask questions to her. Shemay choose to answer some. She
may choose not to answer all ofthem, for a whole lot of
different reasons, when we ringher and have a conversation with
her. We do the DVSAT again, andquite often she'll tell us a lot
more because she feels she's notworried about him getting
charged for something shedoesn't want to say. There's a
(10:13):
whole lot of barriers aroundthat. If she answers yes to 12
or more of the 25 questions,she's escalated to something
called serious threat. Seriousthreat means she is a
participant on the agenda forthe SAM meeting. And the SAM
meeting, when it's held, has awhole bunch of stakeholders that
sit at the table. They all haveto be a manager so they can make
(10:35):
a decision on the spot. And someof the stakeholders, I'll just
in my head, go around the table.So we've got police, WDVCAS,
child protection, housing,education, health, other support
services in our area, example isstaying home leaving violence.
We have the men's supportservice, so male victim
survivors also come to thosemeetings and have their own
(10:56):
advocate. We have corrections,and we have local services that
come local Aboriginal service.And we also have a few other
little services that pop in aswell. If you are a support
service and you do a DVSAT withyour client, which I will say I
would question why you don't aspart of your assessment tool.
Because we need to have a commonlanguage, and the DVSAT is that.
(11:23):
Absolutely! and with that comesa huge bonus of being able to
have her go to the SAM meeting,the worker comes as her
advocate, and she can sit thereand hear what everybody around
the table has to say, becausethe meeting is confidential, so
nothing's minuted around what'sdiscussed. The only things that
are minuted are the actions. Soif she's looking to get an
(11:44):
urgent transfer, then housingwould be a part of that. You'd
the advocate talks to the issueshousing say, well, we will
action this, this and this, andthen in two weeks time, when we
come back, the question isasked, of all of the matters
that have been held previously,they will say, what happened
with this matter? Has this beendone? The best part I love about
(12:04):
the SAM is accountability.Everybody's accountable for what
they say they'll do.
Pauline (12:08):
So there's actually a there is a follow up.
Tanya (12:11):
Yeah and what I would say with the service providers is,
look at the DVSAT. It's not thebe all and end all, but it's
certainly a really key part toassessing risk for domestic
violence, so make it a part ofyour assessment tool. If you're
not, why aren't you? And let'sdo this so that we can make sure
that we have the best outcomeswe can possibly get For
(12:34):
Macarthur in in terms of the SAMmeetings, we've got the largest
Sams that in the state. Ourmeeting goes for about four or
five hours. We have up to 50people on the agenda, and those
matters are consistently doneevery two weeks. So we
understand the risk, weunderstand the role of everyone.
And the stakeholders within ourSam are all there on the same
(12:54):
page. Nobody's there to make ita negative experience for that
victim survivor, our job is tomake sure that she and her
children, if she has children,are safe.
Pauline (13:05):
How many courts are in that area, the South West Sydney
area?
Tanya (13:10):
For our WDVCAS, we only have Campbelltown and Picton
courts. Some other WDVCAS'smight have a lot more,
particularly our rural andregional sister services, they
would have a lot more courts,yeah, and a significant distance
to travel.
Pauline (13:24):
So all of the escalated matters from any of those courts
can end up at a SAM meeting.
Tanya (13:29):
Yes they can and the SAMS are held at different places.
Ours is held at a policestation. They hold them in
different areas around sothey're determined by the police
area command. So, yeah, someWDVCAS's might have two Sam's,
but we only have one.
Pauline (13:47):
so we're going to have the link to the DVSAT on our
show notes for people if theywant to download that for their
file work. So, Tanya, is there atime limit on a woman accessing
your service? And...
Tanya (14:00):
No..
Pauline (14:01):
okay, so they can access multiple times as well?
Tanya (14:04):
Absolutely they can. We've got some clients that
we've had on and off for many,many years. So the way that we
look at it is, if a woman feelsconfident enough to come and
engage with us, it doesn'tmatter how many times she needs
to do that, we want to be thatservice that she feels safe to
go to. She may or may not do thesuggestions and the information
provided, she might make adifferent choice, and that's
(14:26):
fine, but she knows that she'salways got the same space to
come back to as she needs to.
Pauline (14:31):
Excellent, that's really good to know. What are
some of the things that you cantalk to us about, that that
workers and their clients can dotogether to try and make leaving
as safe as possible. It is wellknown amongst workers that it is
the most dangerous time for awoman, or one uou know, one of
the most dangerous times for awoman is when she attempts to
(14:53):
leave. So what is it thatworkers can do together with
clients to try and make that asafe thing to do? Or the safest
possible thing to do.
Tanya (15:01):
The key thing that I I've been probably banging on for
many, many years, is just workcollaboratively. Don't work in a
silo. Put aside your egos. Ifyou work for services where it's
like, oh, we're going to do thisand whatever, whatever. If
you're not going to workcollaboratively, you're not
doing the best that you can forthat client. And what I would
say is, if you've got aeverybody has a WDVCAS. If
(15:24):
you're working with a womanthat's been, for example,
referred to you as an IFPprovider, so you're working with
a family as a whole, you canalways contact your local WDVCAS
and find out if she's workingwith that service as well. And
that way, you inform the client,and you say, hey, you've got
Tanya from Macarthur. WDVCASworking with you, with the AVO
(15:47):
staff, we're going to work withyou with the kids to keep you
safe. Let's just make sure thatyou're clear on who's doing
what, so that women aren'tgetting having to repeat their
story, which is not somethingthat we ever want them to have
to do, and we're all on the samepage the same when we do a
referral to another serviceprovider, if we want to refer
(16:07):
her to another service, we willgive as much information as we
can with her consent, becausethen she doesn't have to retell
that. And that is something thatwe all know gets minimized a
little bit more every time shehas to tell it.
Pauline (16:22):
So is there a flip side to that as well? Like, what's
the best way to support a clientwho stays in the home?
Tanya (16:30):
I think that, you know it varies in different areas. It
really depends what serviceproviders you've got in your
area that can help rememberingthat there are a number of
options. So victim services foran immediate need support
payment, you can apply for moneyto help her get cameras or a
duress alarm, things like that.You can also look locally if
(16:51):
you've got a staying home,leaving violence service, we use
ours all the time, and thebeauty of them is that they do a
home safety audit. So they comeand check out the house. They
know what they're looking for.She may say, I think he's got
cameras here, or I think he'sdone something with my phone.
They can look into all of thatsort of stuff as well. And
having that real model of herbeing as safe as she can so she
(17:16):
doesn't have to move, becausewhy should she, if it's safe
enough for her to stay. Whyshould she have to move? But use
the services that you've got.Another option is also the
escaping violence payment that'savailable, that can also get
things like vouchers or cameras.There are lots of options. If
you're not a service providerthat has a financial brokerage
(17:38):
option in your own funding. Is
Pauline (17:40):
there anything coming up in the DVCAS space that case
workers should keep an eye outfor?
Tanya (17:45):
Look, I think there's always things that are evolving.
What I would say is that youryour local WDVCAS will always
provide that consistent servicesupport around being a DV
specialist service. I do knowthat there is potential to look
at reassessing the DVSAT and thequestions with that, and that's
a work in progress, I would say,to keep in mind too, that
(18:09):
coercive control is such a newthing that I really think
workers really need to do asmuch as they can to be informed
around that and what kind ofresponsibilities they could hold
to support her with that, womenwho might not feel confident to
go to the police, women who'vehad a bad experience with police
before, women who have differentcultural backgrounds that don't
(18:29):
understand the law, women whojust don't want to go to the
police unless they've gotsomeone with them. I think a
really critical part that we allneed to look at is, how are we
supporting her, and how are weensuring that she's well
informed and empowered to makean informed decision, rather
than just saying you can do thisor you can do that?
Pauline (18:50):
So Tanya, can I ask you just a little bit about
specialist roles within theCAS's? Could you tell me a
little bit about those
Tanya (18:57):
sure every women's domestic violence court advocacy
Yeah, fair enough. So we've,we've come to the end. The last
service across the state isfunded for a Aboriginal focus
worker. They're called DFEspecialist workers, Aboriginal
focus every WDVCAS should haveone of those workers. A lot of
other WDVCAS's will also have amulticultural focus worker. What
(19:18):
I have in terms of our keyworkers is we have a number of
DFE specialist workers, but thenwe also have a number of
question I have is, if there'sanything that you could change
caseworkers that have a special,specific area of expertise. So I
have an Aboriginal caseworker, ayouth focused, a disability
focused, a couple of generalistsand an LGBTIQ+ focus caseworker.
(19:40):
So while their core role isworking in those particular
community groups, they will workwith anyone that they need to.
And I think that having thepositions that I've developed
have been specific to the needsof our area. So you may find
about the law in New South Walesand services for victim
that other services may not havespecific roles that we do, but
(20:01):
they would be more focusedtowards what's the needs in
their area, keeping in mind toothat our sister CAS's that are
in rural and regional have verylimited options in terms of
support, so the caseworker maywell be the only person that can
survivors of domestic and familyviolence. What would it be?
work with her, because they havevery little options. Or they've
(20:22):
got waiting lists at other services.
(20:44):
How long have you got? when,when I look at what's on social
media and what's in a whole lotof things is we always hear
about the bad and the negative.I think what we also need to do
is recognize, highlight andsupport the positives that we
see with our local serviceproviders, recognise the hard
(21:05):
work that all the workers inthis sector are doing, recognise
the work that they're doing withsometimes very limited budgets,
and work together. So in change,in terms of the law, I think
that we've got a lot on ourplate at the moment to kind of
digest coercive control and howthat looks, and what we're going
to do to support those victimsurvivors with reporting that,
(21:27):
how we thought, how we alsosupport the police with that
evidence base around thatoffense. I think what we could
do is we could sit down and say,Well, this is bad. This is bad.
This is bad. There's bad inevery sector and every service
provider, whether it's police agovernment department, dv,
workers in general, people arealways going to find negative
(21:50):
experiences. What I wouldsuggest is part of the role that
we all have as advocates is tobe that voice alongside her, to
raise the issues and concerns,but keeping it as a proactive
way of doing it, let's workbetter together. I think one
thing that we do need toconsistently look at for our
(22:10):
space for female victimsurvivors is the primary
aggressor, and how that's seen,particularly at court, when we
end up with women who aredefendants and granted,
sometimes police have no optionsbut to do that because an
offense has occurred, and Iabsolutely recognise that, but I
think that as service providers,we can be that voice in raising
(22:31):
those concerns with those powersthat be, that that she may well
never feel confident tochallenge or not even know what
her rights are around that? Ithink that in terms of service
provision, we've just got towork together like, just do
better. Everybody can do better.We all have positive aspects to
(22:54):
our service provision, but ifwe're not going to work together
with that client centered,trauma informed approach. We're
not doing the job that we shouldbe, and I'll be challenging that
if I have to.
Pauline (23:07):
Yeah excellent.....
Tanya (23:11):
I would say is that you're, if you're a victim,
survivor, or even if you're aservice provider, and you just
look at the sector arounddomestic violence, think I don't
even know where to go, I wouldstrongly say go to your women's
domestic violence court AdvocacyService first. They're the ones
who know the services on theground. They know who's who in
the zoo. They know who's gotwaiting lists. They know who
(23:33):
hasn't at least make that phonecall and see if you can work
together for her. Because havingmore than one service could be
ideal in terms of the serviceprovision that she receives, and
it could also help to make sucha difference to her safety,
because it's not just all on oneservice to do it.
Pauline (23:51):
So thank you so much for joining us today, Tanya,
that has been absolutelywonderful information, and thank
you for sharing the incrediblework that the women's domestic
violence court Advocacy Serviceis doing.
Tanya (24:03):
Thank you. Pleasure to be here and a pleasure to share
that information so that peoplecan work harder and collaborate
more
Pauline (24:10):
Wonderful. This has been till the violence ends,
showcasing the life savingservices addressing gender based
violence every episode until theviolence ends, if you or someone
you know, is being impacted bydomestic violence, please call
the DV hotline on 1800 65 64 63or 1800 RESPECT. That's 1800 73
(24:34):
77 32 or the men's line on 130078 99 78. In any emergency
situation, please call triple O,this has been till the violence
ends. Thank you for listeningand Goodbye, everyone.
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