Gold Coast Centre against Sexual Violence: the Official Opening
Speech by Elizabeth Broderick
Sex Discrimination
Commissioner and Commissioner responsible for Age Discrimination
Gold Coast Centre against Sexual Violence, Southport, Queensland
Friday 26 November 2010
I want to begin by acknowledging that we are gathered here today on the traditional land of the Gombemberri people. I pay my deepest respects to their elders both past and present. Thank you Aunty Patricia for your welcome to country and to the Nunukul Yuggera Aboriginal Dancers performing the smoking ceremony and the performance – it is fantastic that we can open this very important building with such joy and beauty – thank you.
I also want to acknowledge Ron Clarke, the Mayor of the Gold Coast, the State Members of Parliament, Gold Coast City Councillors, and the Queensland Police South East Region Assistant Commissioner, Paul Wilson who is present here today.
It is also a pleasure to see Karen Willis, who is a National Association of Services Against Sexual Violence Board Member and someone I have had the opportunity of working with in Sydney.
Most of all this morning I want to thank Di Macleod, the Director of the Gold Coast Centre against Sexual Violence and the Management Committee for inviting me to be part of today’s ceremony and such a lovely introduction. It is an absolute pleasure to be here to celebrate the opening of this beautiful, purpose built building.
Di and Kellie and the staff of the Gold Coast Centre perform some of the most valuable and unrecognised work in this country and on behalf of the Australian Human Rights Commission I want to say thank you. Thank you for the work you do everyday, for the invaluable support you provide to people when they are at their most vulnerable.
I also want to recognise your tenacity and commitment to making today a reality. I hope that the permanent foundations of this building brings you the stability you need to concentrate on the work that you do and I hope that the expanded services you will be able to offer in this new building will show women the respect and dignity we all deserve, that recovery is possible.
All women have the right to physical and mental safety – the right to be safe in their families, in their homes, in their schools and in their workplaces and in their communities.
Violence against women, including sexual violence, is one of the most persistent and prevalent human rights abuses in Australia as it is across the world.
As you would all know, yesterday was White Ribbon Day. All around Australia, thousands of men stood up and took an oath not to commit or condone violence against women. I attended a number of events and it was inspiring to see men standing up all around this country taking a stand against violence.
Yesterday was also the United Nation’s International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women which means all around the world men and women, political and community leaders, musicians, celebrities and sports personalities, the media, governments, community organisations and corporations acknowledged they can lead the way to eliminating violence against women.
Finally, yesterday also marked the beginning of the 16 Days of Activism against Gender Violence which is, as I am sure many of you know, an annual international campaign which stretches between the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and Human Rights Day on December 10.
Ending violence against women is a shared responsibility. Governments, community, health and legal services, National Human Rights Institutions, communities and individuals – we all have a role to play.
Given yesterday’s significance to the global movement against violence against women, I do want to spend a moment on this point.
I was fortunate enough to spend yesterday afternoon at the launch of the Macleod refuge’s publication, Black and Blue: Never Again which brings together the stories of six women from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds who escaped domestic violence. Told in their own words, these are six of the most articulate and insightful accounts of domestic violence that I have ever read. I know that many of you here today were also in attendance – and it was a fantastic community event.
While events like the launch of Black and Blue and today’s opening showcase the leadership role which community services and government can play in eliminating violence against women, White Ribbon Day and the 16 Days of Activism give us all an opportunity to stand up against all forms of violence against women as members of our communities and as individuals.
In a recent address, the Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon reported that, “violence against women and girls continues unabated in every continent, country and culture. It takes a devastating toll on women's lives, on their families, and on society as a whole. Most societies prohibit such violence – yet the reality is that too often, it is covered up or tacitly condoned.”[1]
The central role which we can all play was highlighted by our then Prime Minster Kevin Rudd, who in 2008 said, “On their own, all the laws in the world can’t stop violence against women unless there is a genuine change in the way that Australian men think.”[2] He is right – we will not end sexual assault and violence against women until we effect dramatic cultural change in our community.
The National Survey on Community Attitudes to Violence against Women undertaken last year shows we have made some important progress on this front. The vast majority of people surveyed did not believe that any physical force against a current or former wife, partner or girlfriend could be justified under any circumstances.[3]
But we still have a long way to go – in regards to sexual assault, just over one in 10 still think that ‘women often say no when they mean yes.’[4] One in three people think that rape occurs because of men ‘not being able to control their need for sex’.[5] And we still have 5% of Australians believing that women cannot be raped by someone with whom they have been sexually intimate.[6]
Evidence shows that rates of false allegations of sexual assault remain low and are comparable with rates found for other person-related offences like mugging. Yet one in four Australians disagree with the statement that ‘women rarely make false claims of being raped’.[7]
The National Survey concluded that the strongest predictors for holding violence-supportive attitudes were being male and having low levels of support for gender equity or equality.[8]
We are all responsible for challenging these attitudes where ever and when ever we come across them.
Since I have been in this position, I have seen significant developments and improvements in the state of gender equality in this country. In just the last 12 months we have seen the appointment of the first female Governor General, the election of our first female Prime Minister and the introduction of the first national paid parental leave scheme.
Despite this, domestic and family violence, sexual assault and sexual harassment remain an everyday reality for many Australian women as they are for women around the world.
In Australia, nearly one in five women has experienced sexual assault since the age of 15 and one in three women has experienced physical assault since the same age.[9]
ABS data suggests one in ten men and women has experienced childhood sexual abuse.[10] Other studies suggest the number is even higher.[11] We also know that the vast majority of women who experience sexual assault do not report it to the police.[12]
Women who have experienced violence are much more likely to seek informal support and may seek assistance from services including the Gold Coast Centre against Sexual Violence and it is crucial that these services are able to offer support to women to recover and to rebuild their lives.
That is why days like today are so important. The opening of these purpose built premises represents the hard work, tenacity and dedication of the Gold Coast Centre against Sexual Violence, Queensland Health and the Gold Coast community.
Funding from Queensland Health means that the Gold Coast Centre against Sexual Violence has been able to actually purchase the land we are standing on, demolish the old buildings and, most excitingly of all, design and build a new centre as well as equip and furnish the new building.
I can also tell you that the foundations of this building broke new ground in more ways than one. In my position I have been able to visit a number of sexual assault and domestic and family violence services and I have yet to be in another purpose built centre.
I have been to the Centre’s old premises and I know the difference that this building will make to the Centre.
Firstly, I hope the fact that these are permanent foundations means that Di and her team will be able spend less of their precious funding on the ever increasing rents of this area. It also means they will be able to spend less of their time trying to secure their tenure.
Of course this, in turn, means they will be able to spend more and more time and resources on providing their invaluable services to the Gold Coast community.
For the first time the Centre will be set out in way that works for the women who use it and those who work here. There are now discreet areas for the administration, counselling and education work of the Centre. I know that we are all going to have the opportunity of going on a tour of this building, and we will be able to see that there are now more counselling rooms, as well as a separate group room, separate staff room and separate training room. When I first visited the Centre, all these functions were squished into one room!
The new building also means the Centre can now expand their own services and cement their relationships with other individuals and services so that this place will become as close as possible to a one stop shop. This includes police, legal, medical as well as additional therapies who will soon be able to offer services from this building. Di has told me of her commitment to wrapping services around the women who use the Centre – I can already see that the space and permanence of this building means that she and her team will be able to continue to develop new ways of delivering support and services to women who have experienced sexual violence. It is exactly this sort of innovation which should also be driving our national response to violence against women and I want to again acknowledge the leadership of both the Gold Coast Centre against Sexual Violence and Queensland Health.
As a national advocate, I am energised by seeing that partnerships and projects and services such as this are possible.
And so it my absolute pleasure to unveil this plaque and declare the Gold Coast Centre against Sexual Violence officially open.
This will be a place where women who have experienced sexual violence can come and begin the process of recovery. This is a place where friends and family members can come for information and support. This is a place that will educate the Gold Coast community on sexual assault and this is a place that will create social change.
Congratulations again.
[1] United Nations, International Women’s Day 2007: Message of the Secretary-General www.un.org/events/women/iwd/2007/sg-message.shtml,
(viewed 23 November 2010)
[2] Quoted in VICHealth, National Survey on Community Attitudes to Violence
Against Women, (2009), p 2
[3] VICHealth, National Survey on Community Attitudes to Violence Against
Women, (2009), p 8
[4] VICHealth, above
[5] VICHealth,
above
[6] VICHealth,
above
[7] VICHealth,
above
[8] VICHealth,
above
[9] Australian Bureau of
Statistics (ABS), Personal Safety, Australia, 2005 (Reissue), Catalogue
No. 4906.0 (2006), p 7
[10] ABS,
above, p 12
[11] J Mouzos & T
Makkai, Women’s Experiences of Male Violence: Findings from the
Australian Component of the International Violence against Women Survey (IVAWS) (2004), Australian Institute of Criminology, Research and Public Policy
Series, No. 56; L Fergus and M Keel, ‘Adult victims/survivors of childhood
sexual assault,’ Australian centre for the Study of Sexual Assault
Wrap, no. 1, November
2005.
[12] ABS, note 9, p 21
