By KATH GANNAWAY
Family violence now perpetrated on parents by adult children…
A FORUM on family Violence in Healesville last week set the seed for a targeted approach to an issue that is finally being recognised as a community problem.
More than 50 people attended the Family Violence Awareness Forum presented by The Rotary Club of Healesville on Wednesday 3 December, which aimed to put the facts on the table, and then ask “what next?”.
The statistics are always shocking, and they are now well documented, but there were some surprises still.
For Rotary Community Service director, David Lau, the big one was the rise in children who abuse their parents.
“The thing that really stuck me was when Michelle gave her presentation about the violators, not so much the men, which is well known, but the children,” he said.
“That really shocked me. I would never have thought of that.”
It came as a surprise to a lot of people in the room who are not directly involved with family violence.
Sergeant Michelle Clooney is Family Violence Advisor Outer East with Victoria Police.
She said, among other things, that a “huge proportion” of family violence is adult child violence against a parent.
“Parents are often very reluctant to report that abuse; they are very protective of their child,” she said.
She said there were 7000 family violence reports in Eastern Region and 1300 a year in Yarra Ranges.
While in the past there were not the increases in family violence statistics in Yarra Ranges that were happening in other areas, a 25 per cent increase in the area has been put down to the message getting out and people feeling more comfortable coming forward.
Eighty-eight of the reports were in Healesville.
She said the drivers for family violence in Healesville were no surprise – alcohol, drugs and mental health issues.
“One of the biggest risk times is when a woman makes a move to leave the relationship. Sixteen of those reports involved a recent separation,” she said.
Julia Blackburn, Health Promotion co-ordinator with Yarra Valley Community Health set the scene, detailing the various behaviours that constitute family violence, the root causes and strategies.
“It’s about power and control; a pattern of abusing behaviour through which a person seeks to control or dominate another person or people,” she said.
She said while many people still see family violence as a physical thing, it is also psychological abuse, sexual, financial, spiritual or cultural abuse and, a new one, technology and social media abuse.
“It can be one, or quite often, all of these things.”
Social isolation was common and while reports are continuing to rise, most family violence still goes unreported.
“The impacts are physical injury, mental trauma and stress, mental illness, financial problems, housing issues, trauma to pets, inability to work, fear, and the key causes and contributing factor is inequality between men and women,” she said.
She said the biggest risk factor of experiencing family violence was being a woman.
“We identify it as a gender problem because of this – maintaining rigid gender roles and stereotypes and broader cultures of violence.
“Respect and equality; if you take nothing else away from this forum tonight, take away respect and equality,” she said.
Fiona Grasby from Yarra Valley Community Health also spoke. Her first piece of advice was “If you are talking about immediate risk, always phone triple-zero”.
She said that services such as the Eastern Legal Community Centre and YVCH have had an advocacy role and provided counselling in Healesville and in Yarra Junction.
The question now, according to Mr Lau, is what next.
He said Rotary had become involved after talking with Yarra Ranges Council Community Development officer, Jessica Adams, who identified family violence as an important and critical issue in the community.
“This forum was about looking at awareness for some of the providers, and seeing where we go from there,” he said.
He said there would be a debriefing session to see what ideas came from the forum and to look at “what next?”.
