SUBMISSION
New South Wales Women’s Economic Review: Women and children’s safety: The bedrock of economic opportunity
This submission details the interrelated nature of safety from violence and economic security, identifies three relevant research clusters, and outlines a proposal for the NSW Government to increase funding for ANROWS to continue developing the evidence base on women’s safety to ensure that economic opportunities are available for every woman.
ANROWS outlines the relationship between economic security and domestic and family violence (DFV). The submission explains that women experiencing DFV are more likely to experience ongoing and significant financial stress, that economic security contributes to a heightened risk of DFV, and that economic disparity within relationships is associated with intimate partner violence.
The submission argues that a robust and contextualised evidence base is needed to ensure that legal and policy reforms contribute to women’s and children’s safety from DFV and, in turn, create the conditions upon which economic security and opportunity can be achieved. The submission provides an overview of the following research clusters that align with NSW Government priorities:
- Safe at home and healing, focused on the right of women and children to live safely at home, with their families, and free from violence, as well as the need for access to evidence- and trauma-informed and culturally safe healing responses
- Intervening early to keep young people who use violence safe, connected and free from harm, focused on older children and young people who are using violence in the home or engage in harmful sexual behaviours
- Perpetrator interventions, focused on building the evidence base on perpetrators of violence.
ANROWS identifies implications for policy and practice, including the need to:
- Improve risk assessment and intervention practices
- Support the inclusion of women’s and children’s safety in perpetrator programs
- Address structural obstacles for safety to support women’s economic opportunities.
ANROWS also outlines a proposal for the NSW Government to strengthen investment in ANROWS to ensure that our research can have a greater impact on women and children in New South Wales.
Suggested citation
Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety. (2022). Submission to NSW Women’s Economic Review – Women and children’s safety: The bedrock of economic opportunity [Submission]. ANROWS.