A central objective of the Plan of Action is to establish and foster a coherent response to the problem of violence against women and their children.
Responding to violence against women requires high-level input from practitioners across a range of disciplines to ensure a holistic and adequate response, including from the police; state, territory and federal courts, and other elements of the justice system; health, community and government services working with women and their children; and those working with the perpetrators of violence. While services and programs are in place across all Australian jurisdictions to respond to violence against women and their children, commonly the responses are fragmented, with varying degrees of coordination across service sectors and between different levels of government. This is frequently the result of services having being designed to respond to single problems and the establishment of organisations which were targeted at particular client groups266. This results in gaps in service provision, on the one hand, and duplication of services on the other.
This absence of systems that can mesh effectively has a real and profound impact on women who experience violence.
'I found it so hard when I had to go from the police station, to the court house, to organise a lawyer, to find a JP to witness my signature, all that running around at a time I felt so anxious and tired. When I asked questions about what to expect, it seemed I could only get information about their bit and I had to keep asking. It would have been less stressful if I could have been told about the big picture, told what to expect and what to do, where to go, instead of me having to find it all out myself.'
Woman accessing services in North Queensland, 2008
Policy makers and researchers from Australia and around the world are grappling with common challenges that are associated with complex and fragmented human service systems. A range of solutions is being developed and implemented by service providers that seeks to rely on more serial ways of working, differing in the level of time, resources and commitment required. These include low-intensity forms of cooperation such as networking and coordination, moving to higher-intensity forms of cooperation such as collaboration and partnership267 268 .
The development of these solutions is occurring at several levels:
- a whole-of-government level – involving senior government representation in the identification and ownership of shared objectives and goals, and the identification of a strategic approach;
- a service system or program level – requiring collaborative efforts by government agencies and service providers to better coordinate the delivery of services relating to one issue or client group; establish operational and information protocols; or to co-locate or fully integrate relevant programs or services through structural change269 270;
- a community, place or local level – requiring multiple agencies to work together to share responsibility for actions, plan activities and pool efforts or resources for action271;
- at an individual level – requiring multiple service providers to collaborate around and with a client, to plan and respond to their individual needs and aspirations (often referred to as ‘wrap-around’272 or ‘victim-centred’ models of care).
'The Victorian Government’s family violence reforms are based on a sustained partnership between the Government, police, courts and community services to deliver a more integrated response to family violence - joining up police, justice and family violence services to:
- improve the safety of women and children who experience violence (including supporting women and children to remain in the family home where appropriate), and
- improve the accountability of men who use violence.
Government leadership and coordination is provided through five Ministers working together with a shared focus on addressing family violence, supported by a whole of government Family Violence Interdepartmental Committee. A key aspect to date has been the development of coordinated regional systems that demonstrate how the justice and community support responses can work together to assist women and children who are victims of family violence.'
Victorian Office of Women’s Policy
The need for improved collaboration of policies, programs and services was a constant feature raised in the written submissions to the Council, reinforcing the message that collaboration is often most effective when it brings about a holistic response for individual women who have experienced violence. Several examples of good practice in Australia and internationally demonstrate a range of agencies collaborating around the victim to ensure effective, integrated responses to achieve better case coordination and case management. The Minneapolis model in the USA has been identified in the literature as a particularly good example - where police, trained advocates, and judicial officers work together to ensure that the woman receives high quality health services and an effective justice response, and the woman’s needs (including housing, income support, and child custody) are met. The perpetrator is referred to a treatment program273.
Some key features of effective victim-centred sexual assault crisis care include:
- providing information to the woman about all aspects of the response;
- ensuring the woman has an opportunity to provide informed consent274 to procedures and actions undertaken;
- allowing the woman to have control over the pace and nature of any physical examination and control over all decision-making;
- attention to the woman’s broader needs275 276.
The Integrated Coordinating Committee (ICC) has been in place since the roll-out of Safe At Home in Tasmania in 2004. It meets on a weekly basis and involves direct service providers representing each of the key stakeholders: the Police Victims Safety Response Team; Police Prosecutor; Child Protection; Family Violence Counselling and Support Service – adult and children’s services; Court Support and Liaison officers, representatives from the Family Violence Offender Intervention Program; and Special Needs Liaison Officer if there is a mutual client. Visitors from Legal Aid, Community Corrections and other justice programs, e.g. Court Corrections may attend if appropriate.
The ICC meets weekly to discuss all new and active Safe at Home cases. It’s assessed as effective because all partners together are able to manage the risk and safety of their clients. Collectively they develop the case management strategy and together they nominate the most appropriate case manager – whoever has most contact with the client – this could be any one of this group as most clients have multiple needs. ICC members have scope to call out-of-session emergency case conferences, which has happened on a few occasions.
A formal education/training strategy was employed for all agencies during the implementation phase of Safe at Home. This involved combined agency training delivered on a regional basis to all practitioners and managers involved in Safe at Home. This fostered integration and developed the relationships and networks necessary to cope with rapid change. This was supplemented by further facilitated interagency workshops on significant issues such as case coordination and integration.
Safe at Home
The Tasmanian Government’s response to family violence
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Achieving collaboration
Although many Australian jurisdictions have been implementing initiatives based on greater collaboration, there are several barriers to effective collaboration and partnership that need to be addressed. While collaborative working is seen by some to be a cost-effective way of delivering social services, a lack of resources for the existing service system places considerable strain on collaboration, owing to a lack of time and staff to participate in necessary planning, and a lack of services for clients to access277.
In addition, for collaboration at the whole-of-government level to be successful, efforts must be championed at the highest levels of government and within the community278, and there need to be designated resources that enable participants to dedicate the necessary energy, commitment and enthusiasm to make collaborative efforts and investments work279. Performance monitoring of government agencies and service providers, and program evaluation, must also measure, evaluate and reward collaborative effort280.
Community planning models are being explored and used overseas, with positive examples in Virginia, USA281 and Glasgow, Scotland282. In the USA, the job of community planning councils is 'to stitch together the whole range of separate public, voluntary and increasingly, private activities into a rational, effective response to human needs which is appropriate to each of their particular communities'283. Glasgow provides a practical example of how the community planning partnership approach can operate in a complex city environment with pockets of severe deprivation. Across different geographic areas ranging from linkages to national and regional agendas through to creating and integrating the planning of five strategic areas and 10 local areas, Glasgow supports its approach through the establishment of Glasgow Community Partnership Limited284.
Community involvement in identifying local priorities and having a say in how funds were spent locally was a strong theme throughout the consultations.
The Duluth Domestic Abuse Intervention Project (DAIP) from Duluth, Minnesota in the USA, has been adopted around the world as excellent practice. DAIP incorporates perpetrator programs within an integrated approach which monitors the systems response to domestic and family violence. The principles include:
- the onus of intervention is shifted from the victim to the system;
- the abuser is held accountable for his use of violence;
- all agencies involved (police, courts, victim support, probation and abuser education) are integrated and their approach is through coordinated protocol development;
- all systems are monitored to ensure accountability and compliance with policies285.
The Council’s consultations during the development of Plan of Action also indicated that competitive tendering between organisations for funding to provide services is seen to be a barrier to effective collaboration.
The literature acknowledges that competition for resources between service providers can create a culture of self-preservation and suspicion that undermines characteristics of relationships that are important for effective collaboration: like mutual interest and a high degree of trust286 287. A lack of certainty for service providers in relation to their ongoing funding can also undermine collaboration and the achievement of outcomes over time, by reducing stability and continuity288 289.
'Governments need to develop more nimble, flexible and responsive ways of engaging with and supporting local communities, especially remote Indigenous communities. Too often the standard methodology is to develop a generic set of outcomes which are predetermined in Canberra or Perth and community organisations then desperately try to shoe-horn themselves into the program guidelines. Too often also the program they are trying to shoe-horn into is a program from one government agency which is only really interested in its particular delineated portfolio. Too often there is no such thing as a ‘youth’ but instead what exists in the minds of government are ‘student’, ‘student with special needs’, ‘Indigenous student’, ‘juvenile offender’, ‘juvenile drug-user’ etc. In the Kimberley there are some 22 language groups and there are a myriad of socio-economic factors at play just in this one region of Western Australia. Given these realities, we call on government to be more nimble, flexible and responsive to the needs of communities.'
Centre Coordinator, Kimberly WA, 2008
A lack of communication and collaboration between government and non-government organisations is a further barrier to systems working together effectively that must be addressed. National and international research suggests that to protect women and their children from harm, government and non-government organisations and members of the public must share information290. Sharing of information is also a contributor to good practice where more than one service is involved in supporting a client.
There is also a need to balance this sharing of information with the privacy rights of the woman and their children. While privacy laws generally allow the sharing of information between government agencies and other specified organisations where there is a serious and imminent threat to a person’s safety291, there is a need for protocols that facilitate information sharing where a woman’s safety is at risk. Indeed, many service providers report inconsistencies in the way privacy laws and principles are applied, suggesting the need for clarification of, and/or education for, relevant agencies about privacy laws and principles.
Common risk assessment tools are also an important aspect of improving the consistency and effectiveness of service responses across systems and organisations. Adopting a common approach for assessing and managing domestic and family violence throughout the service system ensures the focus of intervention and support remains on the safety of victims/survivors, and that they receive a consistent response regardless of the approach of the organisation that is providing the service292.
The ACT’s Family Violence Intervention Program (FVIP) operates at a macro level, co-ordinating policy, administrative and technological infrastructure and legislation to streamline the criminal justice system’s response to domestic and family violence; and at the micro level to co-ordinate case management, individual practitioner decision-making and the monitoring of those decisions to ensure best possible outcomes for victims/survivors and that men are held accountable.
The core agencies participating in the FVIP are: the Australian Federal Police (servicing the ACT), Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Magistrates Court, ACT Corrective Services, the Department of Justice and Community Safety; the independent offices of the Victims of Crime Coordinator and of Legal Aid (ACT); the non-government Domestic Violence Crisis Service; Relationships Australia and, more recently, the Office of Children, Youth and Family Support (incorporating Care and Protection Services).
The collaborative arrangements and the common purpose between these government and non-government organisations were established through negotiated protocols, signed in 1998. These protocols formally committed agencies to the following four overarching aims:
- To work together cooperatively and effectively;
- To maximise safety and protection for victims of family violence;
- To provide opportunities for offender accountability and rehabilitation; and
- To seek continual improvement.
Holder and Mayo, 2001
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Strategies and actions
To ensure that systems work together effectively, the National Council’s Plan of Action identifies three key strategies:
6.1 Ensure governments deliver what communities need.
6.2 Coordinate responses.
6.3 Build the evidence base.
6.1 Ensure governments deliver what communities need
6.1.1 Commonwealth, State, Territory and local government agencies work collaboratively to: develop policy, planning and service delivery responses for sexual assault, domestic and family violence; and establish performance reporting measures that recognise and encourage collaborative achievements and identify fragmented delivery of programs and/or services.
6.1.2 Support and/or establish community partnership planning mechanisms that enable communities and services to prioritise need, address gaps and unnecessary duplication in service provision, and contribute to the development of policy, planning and delivery at the local level.
6.1.3 Ensure funding models and reporting requirements do not overburden community based organisations and/or detract from achieving outcomes.
6.1.4 Support and further develop community volunteering and exchange systems between staff in the government and the sexual assault and domestic and family violence sectors.
6.1.5 Ensure Government funding processes support collaboration and cooperation in local communities not competition.
6.2 Coordinate responses
6.2.1 Support and/or develop information sharing systems and protocols between all organisations in response to sexual assault and domestic and family violence, that give primacy to the safety of women and their children.
6.2.2 Ensure resource allocation models promote continuity of funding for local programs where they are shown to be effective through evaluation.
6.2.3 Ensure that community planning partnerships work together at the local level to build client-centred service systems that are simple and practical to access and use.
6.2.4 Ensure mechanisms are in place to facilitate appropriate information sharing between relevant government, and other, agencies to enable services and supports to ‘wrap-around’ women who have been violated, and their children.
6.3 Build the evidence base
6.3.1 Further develop risk assessment tools that assess the danger that women and their children may be in, in order to guide service responses and perpetrator management.
6.3.2 Investigate simplified outcomes and indicators for domestic violence and sexual assault to reduce the reporting burden and gather consistent evidence.
6.3.3 Investigate a better balance between individual privacy and the safety needs of individual clients and recommend ways to better ensure the safety of women and children.
6.3.4 Investigate and establish what minimum level of services and infrastructure is required in different geographic settings to achieve minimum domestic and family violence and sexual assault prevention and response outcomes.
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References
Attorney General’s Department of NSW (2005) Responding to sexual assault: the way forward. Sydney: Attorney General’s Department of NSW.
Daka-Mulwanda, V. (1995) ‘Collaboration of Services for Children and Families’, Family Relations, no. 44.
Domestic Violence Council of Western Australia (2000) Literature review on models of coordination and integration of service delivery. Perth: Domestic Violence Council of Western Australia.
Glasgow Community Planning Partnership website (2005), accessed February 2009.
Mattessich, P. and Monsey, B. (1992) Collaboration: What makes it work, St Paul MA: Amherst H Wilder Foundation.
Morrison, T. (1996) ‘Partnership and collaboration: rhetoric and reality’, Child Abuse and Neglect, vol. 20, no. 2.
National Association of Planning Councils website (2009), accessed February 2009.
NSW Government (2006) Interagency Guidelines for Child Protection. Sydney: Department of Community Services.
North Queensland Domestic Violence Resource Service (1995) Dovetail – Townsville Integrated Approach Brochure.
Pope, J. and Lewis, J. (2008) ‘Improving partnership governance: using a network approach to evaluate partnerships in Victoria, Australian Journal of Public Administration, vol. 67, no. 4.
Sullivan, H. and Sketcher, C. (2002) Working across boundaries: collaboration in public services. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.
Tschudin, B. (1995) ‘Immediate care for women after sexual and physical assault’, Ther Umsch, vol. 62, no. 4.
Victorian Government (2007) Family Violence: Risk Assessment and Risk Management, Melbourne: Department of Victorian Communities.
Vincent, I. (1999) ‘Collaboration and integrated services in the NSW public sector’, Australian Journal of Public Administration, vol. 58, no. 3.
Virginia General Assembly (2008) 37.2-316. System restructuring; state and community consensus and planning team required. Code of Virginia (Statutory Law), Legislation Information System. Available from: <http://leg1.state.va.us/cgi-bin/legp504.exe?000+cod+37.2-316>, accessed February 2009.
Winer, M. and Ray, R. (1997) Collaboration handbook: creating, sustaining and enjoying the journey. St Paul MA: Amherst H Wilder Foundation.
Woodruff, J. and O’Brien, J. (2005) ‘Children’s and Family Services working together’, Australian Journal of Early Childhood, vol. 30, no. 1.
World Health Organisation (2003) Guidelines for medico-legal care for victims of sexual violence. Geneva: World Health Organisation.
Wyles, P. (2007) ‘Success with Wraparound: A collaborative, individualised, integrated and strength based model’, Youth Studies Australia, vol. 26, no. 4.
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