News
Major funding boost for family violence training
The Federal Government has said it plans to provide further training to 5000 primary care workers across Australia.
The training is designed to reflect evidence-based trauma-informed models of care and culturally appropriate care.
Family violence has been in the spotlight, with two large funding pledges from the Federal Government.
In one announcement, Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt said the Government is committing $9.6 million to boost family violence care.
Of that funding, Minister Hunt said $2.1 million over three years will be invested to train 5000 primary care workers across Australia, including GPs, ‘to better respond and support family violence victims’.
That training will be delivered by accredited providers and will reflect evidence-based trauma-informed models of care and culturally appropriate care.
‘This measure also supports an update of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners’ Abuse and violence: Working with our patients in general practice,’ Minister Hunt said.
‘After family and friends, it is GPs and other primary care providers who survivors of family and domestic violence turn to for support.
‘The quality of the response from the GP has been found to have a deep and profound impact on victims, influencing whether they seek help and support in the future.’
A further $7.5m will be provided over three years towards expanding the Recognise, Respond and Refer Program, an initiative of the Brisbane South Primary Health Network (PHN) to a further four PHN regions.
The trial states that it will:
- deliver whole-of-practice training to GP staff to recognise the signs of family violence
- develop locally relevant care and referral pathways for people who are, or are at risk of, experiencing family violence
- provide post-training support to practices to assist them to put in place training to identify and support victims of family violence
- develop models to integrate primary healthcare into the domestic and family violence sector in the local region, including clear roles for GPs.
The Government also pledged $328 million to a fourth wave of family violence programs. This funding is the biggest commitment so far under a federal and state plan to reduce violence against women, which has been underway since 2010.
‘A culture of disrespect toward women is a precursor to violence and anyone who doesn’t see that is kidding themselves,’ Prime Minister Scott Morrison said ahead of this announcement.
‘This is about changing attitudes to violence and helping those who think violence is an option to stop.’
Of the new funding, $68 million will go towards a ‘Prevention Hub’ for community education and support programs in a bid to stop violence from happening in the first place.
The Prevention Hub will be staffed by fully-paid experts and will design education campaigns to take to schools, community groups and groups which are considered highly vulnerable, such as new mothers.
Another $64 million will be committed to the
1800RESPECT family violence hotline, $82 million will fund frontline services, and $35 million will go towards Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.
Another $60 million will go towards providing emergency housing for women experiencing family violence, and $18 million to upgrade home security for women and children to stay in their homes – measures that were announced on 10 February.
This new funding will start to flow on 1 July.
According to
White Ribbon Australia, on average one woman a week is murdered by her current or former partner, and one in four women have experienced emotional abuse by a current or former partner since the age of 15.
family violence funding GP training prevention
newsGP weekly poll
Do you think changes are needed to make the PBS authority approval process more streamlined for GPs?