National cabinet agrees on $4.7 billion dollar plan for domestic and family violence

ABC NEWS (Australia)

National Cabinet has met to decide on a $4.7 billion spending plan for domestic and family violence. The states discussed today how the money would be spent.

Transcript

00:00Things were absolutely tense this morning, particularly over this promise to hire 500

00:07new frontline workers across the country.

00:09So most of the states and territories have missed their commitments for the mid-year

00:14for June 30.

00:15And the Minister for Social Services, the Federal Minister, Amanda Rishworth, commented

00:19on that yesterday, saying the Federal Government had given the states the money, now they needed

00:23to step up.

00:24We heard from Queensland Premier Stephen Miles this morning saying those comments weren't

00:28helpful.

00:29Today it looks like, you know, things have been discussed in National Cabinet around

00:32this and they've hashed it out and, as Stephen Miles himself said at the press conference

00:37shortly after the meeting, they've reached a deal.

00:40The comments I was responding to are unhelpful but we've been able to secure I think a really

00:45valuable deal today because all of the leaders of the states and territories and the Prime

00:50Minister agree that this is a major challenge and that we need to work together to address

00:56it.

00:57This is a key extension of a national partnership agreement around community legal services,

01:01things like domestic violence legal services, but also legal aid and other things like that.

01:07And so the Prime Minister has actually walked out how this kind of money is going to be

01:11spent because this is an extension of an ongoing agreement that is going to be a bit of a boost

01:15though as part of it.

01:16Here he is explaining how it's going to work.

01:19One is indexation and a higher rate of indexation.

01:23The second is dealing with pay parity.

01:27And then on top of that an additional $500 million as well, which will be particularly

01:33for women needing those legal services.

01:39That will be done, of course, managed through the states and territories.

01:43We'll have oversight in the way that these things work.

01:47They're in the best position to determine where the funding needs are.

01:55Prime Minister Anthony Albanese there following today's National Cabinet meeting and we also

01:59heard from state premiers and the Territory Chief Ministers as well because of course

02:03this meeting follows the last meeting they had in May where they commissioned a rapid

02:07review of how to best prevent violence against women.

02:10That brought back its recommendations a couple of weeks ago.

02:12One of them was to significantly curb alcohol delivery to the home.

02:17We asked the state premiers and chief ministers today whether they're willing to do that.

02:21They've actually established a further review of their own looking at how they could possibly

02:25implement that in their states and territories.

02:27But we'll have to wait and see how that all pans out.

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