Behaviour program making breakthroughs with men in Western Australia

ABC NEWS (Australia)

A small town in Western Australia is making breakthroughs for those struggling with domestic violence. A program at the Emama Nguda Aboriginal Corporation in derby in the Kimberley aims to address violent behaviour.

Transcript

00:00I've been in the role for two years, two years since 2022, so February 2022, to be more precise.

00:10I think it's the way the, it's the way the, this organization is able to make a difference

00:17to people's lives.

00:20I've seen that since joining, since joining the organization, it's an Aboriginal community

00:26control organization.

00:28They do, they do quite really good work with engaging local, particularly local Indigenous

00:36people, but generally through the general public too, as well.

00:40Since doing the role, I've seen nothing else, nothing else but young people, young Indigenous

00:45people coming through, handing their resumes through, handing their resumes in, wanting

00:52to inquire about jobs that might be available, you know, leaving their contact details, and

00:57that was quite refreshing to see.

00:59So when I, when I joined the role, they, I was stationed at the front, front office,

01:06and where I was situated, I could actually see the general public coming in, people coming

01:13in to inquire about jobs and stuff.

01:16That proved to me that, you know, the organization that I'm currently working for is, they do

01:24quite magic work in terms of getting people, making a difference in people's lives.

01:31I've seen that already over the last two years in this job, however, the actual service has

01:37been running for quite a few years before I came in, and the Imamangure itself is just

01:46that, does a wonderful, fantastic job with engaging people to get into, back into the

01:52workforce.

01:53And tell us, and Floyd, tell us, so tell us how it works when someone comes in and

01:59they want, they are probably domestic violence perpetrators themselves, what do you do with

02:05them to work through their issues and make a difference?

02:09Yeah, sure, thanks, Geoff.

02:12My role is, I'm called a men's worker, and my role is to work with men who use violence

02:19against their loved ones, their families.

02:22This program that we operate, it's in partnership with one of our great organizations, CNWA,

02:30Anglicare Western Australia, so it's a partnership between our organization and Anglicare Western

02:37Australia.

02:38My role is to provide the men's service as part of this partnership to work with men

02:44who use violence, and what we do here is that we, you know, offer men to come to join us,

02:52to come on board to join us and to come to do these weekly workshops that we run, addressing

02:59family violence issues, and together we work on strategies and work on techniques on how

03:09to get men to lower their use of violence, so that it's not kind of, you know, going

03:16to you from generation to generation, but it's going, running really well.

03:21And can you tell us anything about the techniques that you talk through with these men to get

03:27on top of what they've been doing?

03:30Yeah, thanks for that.

03:32We have, the part of the workshops is that when we run them, we have one of our female

03:41colleagues from our partnering organization, Anglicare, from Anglicare, and that's a young

03:47lady by the name of Carissa O'Meara.

03:51She's a co-facilitator, so she co-facilitates these workshops with me, with the men, and

03:57it's a wonderful aspect because the guys in the workshops are able to ask our female co-facilitator

04:05questions relating to what they're experiencing at home with their partners.

04:09So in essence, the guys that are asking the questions about what happens in home and our

04:17female co-facilitator, she's able to provide that woman's perspective about why she might

04:24become angry or why she might become annoyed or such, so that they get a more understanding

04:31from the female aspect.

04:33But overall, it's pretty much group therapy.

04:38So as a group, co-facilitators with the men, we all talk about family domestic violence

04:45in the general sense, even though the sessions are run from week to week and different topics

04:49from week to week, but the sessions are run in a group therapy type way where we're all

04:56talking about family domestic violence because we've all experienced family domestic violence

05:01in some way, shape, form or another.

05:04And can you tell us about any individuals, obviously without identifying them, but any

05:09individual stories of men who've come through the program and you've seen a big change in

05:15how they approach things?

05:19We've had a few men now who have come to our workshops who are users of family violence

05:27and they are, you know, a couple maybe will touch on the use of violence when they come

05:36to the workshops, they may go home, they might have a bit of an incident, however,

05:44they're still continuing to come to these workshops to talk about what they've experienced

05:48at home.

05:49So the current events that are happening at home, they come to the workshops to kind of

05:55discuss in a very, very sensitive way, but in the most respectful way that they can with

06:02anyone, you know, giving any kind of, hinting towards any sort of negativity.

06:09But the workshops are run in such a way where these guys are feeling comfortable because

06:13I guess one of the advantages of it is because myself and the co-facilitator, our female

06:20co-facilitator, we're all local people.

06:23And generally the general sense is that with our workshop participants, the men, we all

06:29seem to know, sort of affiliated or sort of know who is related to who, how people

06:37are connected together.

06:39That's very, very important in this context when running these types of workshops for

06:44our Indigenous men locally.

06:47And so, yeah, it really feels like you're making a difference?

06:51Yes.

06:52You know, we've even had a, we've had a fellow who's been placed on a community-based order.

06:59So rather than sending him to jail, he was placed on a community-based order.

07:05He's come to the workshops and now he's completed the community-based order.

07:11However, he's now, you know, returned back home to his partner.

07:17And his partner has also approached us to say how much difference he's seen at home

07:22to as well.

07:23So it's, you know, and just to hear that, it's wonderful news.

07:28It's great news.

07:29It's fantastic news.

07:31We haven't heard any other incidents about this guy who was placed on a community-based

07:37order, who was ordered to come to the workshops.

07:40And now he's, we don't hear any further incidents as such by way of referrals.

07:45So it's fantastic news.

07:46And I think it's very important.

07:48And having feedback like that, it says to us that, you know, we must be making some

07:54kind of difference here, but just to, and an individual who's done that, who's gone

07:59through that, it's just fantastic news.

08:01So it's quite refreshing.

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