Women’s Health West has called for better police training after the force claimed there had been 57 family violence incidents in Melbourne’s west in June in which females were the perpetrators.
Giving evidence at the Royal Commission on Family Violence last week, WHW Family Violence Services manager Jacky Tucker said the claim signalled that police needed more training to “accurately identify the perpetrator”.
“We recognise on occasions that it may be difficult for police to ascertain who is the primary aggressor when they attend,” Ms Tucker said. “My experience is that, when a woman is referred to us as a respondent, they are most likely to have used violence as self-defence and are, in fact, the primary victim of a perpetrator.
“We received 733 police referrals [in June]. For 676 of these, the police identified male perpetrators.
“For the remaining 57, the police identified female perpetrators … but only six were assessed by us as likely being the perpetrators,” Ms Tucker said.
She said it was a myth that women were always submissive when victims of family violence. “Because a woman is angry, there’s some reason that anger is then transferred to identifying her as the perpetrator, where in fact she is not.”
She said there had been “dramatic” change in the family violence sector in the past 10 years.
“I think the relationship between police and family violence services, specifically women’s services, has changed from what used to be seen as a nearly combative relationship, to really viewing each other as partners in responding to family violence. It’s just a different mindset.”
Star Weekly revealed last month that family violence referrals by police to WHW had more than doubled in the past two years.
Ms Tucker said referrals had jumped from 708 in 2006, to 8170 in the past year, with 750 to 900 referrals a month.
“I keep thinking we will reach peak numbers, but it just keeps increasing,” she said. “Increased demand on police services is therefore a sign of progress. What we don’t know is whether violence against women is also increasing – there is no data that allows us to gauge that.”
