Our vision, purpose, values and approach

Intersectionality is a prism for seeing the way in which various forms of inequality often operate together and exacerbate each other.

Gender inequality is an underlying determinant of family violence, particularly violence against women, which is why our work is founded on achieving gender equality in public life and personal relationships.

Informed by decades of advocacy by Black feminist and anti-colonial movements, we adopt an intersectional approach to achieving gender equality and to dismantling oppressive systems and structures, because people’s experiences of sexism, racism, homophobia, colonialism, or inequalities based on class, gender identity, age and ability often intersect and exacerbate each other.

Long histories of violence and systematic discrimination have created deep intersecting inequities that disadvantage many from the outset. The Everybody Matters: Inclusion and Equity Statement sets out the government’s 10-year vision for a more inclusive, safe, responsive and accountable family violence system.

The system we are building needs to be inclusive, non-discriminatory and accessible to all. We are building a system in which all services respect, recognise and respond to diversity. This means focusing on policy, programs and practices which meet the intersectional needs of victim survivors and children and families and provide tailored and culturally appropriate interventions to perpetrators.

You’ve got to look after each part of the acronym LGBTIQ. We are people who sit under each of those letters. And we have very different needs.

Dhelk Dja: Safe Our Way – Strong Culture, Strong Peoples, Strong Families is the Aboriginal led 10-year agreement to address family violence in Aboriginal communities.

First response is so important: In terms of when you finally decide to do something about the violence, at whatever level and whatever part of the community you are in, it is important that the people you speak to are understanding and reinforce that you have choices to be supported.

In 2020, FSV joined other Victorian government departments to report annually on how we are embedding self-determination in all that we do: our systems, our people, how we work to achieve outcomes and how we stay accountable to Aboriginal Victorians.

FSV is committed to supporting all staff across the organisation to work in culturally safe ways and to be active allies in leading the Dhelk Dja implementation and bringing the vision of Dhelk Dja to life.

We recognise that specialist family violence services, sexual violence services and children and family services provide the foundation for the effectiveness of the reforms across the state, and value their expertise in contributing to and informing our work.

We remain committed to ensuring we actively and meaningfully collaborate with all our partner agencies, across specialist services, core support services, mainstream or social support services, and universal services in our communities, to achieve our shared goals.

We need to talk about people. People are going to make the system changes from within. The culture, the way we talk to victims. If we don’t bring the human connection, then the reforms won’t work.

The Victim Survivors’ Advisory Council (VSAC), established in July 2016 to give people with lived experience of family violence a voice, and ensure they contribute to and influence the design and implementation of family violence reforms.

Family Safety Victoria is committed to and has led engagement with people with lived experience of family violence and children and families in need of support in every part of how we design, implement, resource and measure services, systems and policies.

I think it’s really great [to be involved at a strategic level], it speaks volumes to be part of the formative pieces of work. To shape the culture of the way people are thinking.

We know that to build a service system that works for victim survivors, we must actively empower people with lived experience to have a central voice in our work.

We have designed structures and created opportunities for people with a lived experience to continue to influence, inform and contribute to the family violence reforms.

The sharing of experiences and insights provides us with a deeper understanding of the needs, preferences, and values of people for whom the system exists and how to prioritise victim survivor safety, agency and choice.

When people with a lived experience share their stories and experiences, it can influence change in perspectives, behaviours and organisational processes for government and the sector.

The foundations of our engagement with people with lived experience can be summarised as:

• Being inclusive of and respectful of the leadership of Aboriginal communities, and including the perspectives of people from diverse communities as well as children and young people.
• Offering a value exchange for people with lived experience. We recognise the value of lived experience expertise and offer professional development opportunities and remunerate people for their time and expertise.
• Providing transparency on what level of influence is possible during engagements.
• Using trauma-informed approaches, with staff undertaking critical reflection activities to understand inherent power imbalances, sensitivities and the impact of language.
• Providing space for respectful, safe and empowering experiences for people with a lived experience.

Over the next 3 years, we will steward the work of engaging with people with lived experience across government and services through the development of a lived experience plan. This will outline how and why the organisation engages people with lived experience.

It will also outline how expertise in engaging lived experience will be strengthened, through tools to build staff engagement capabilities, new approaches to hear a broader range of voices and to build connections across a range of lived experience initiatives, as well as evaluation approaches to ensure sustainability, continuous improvement and organisational learning.

Family Safety Victoria continues to be led by the courageous and important voices of people with lived experience, who hold the organisation accountable to ensuring this work is delivered “with us not for us.”

Poem from VSAC member

In the beginning it was a
sick feeling in my tummy.

What he said, how he
made us feel, the way he
thought it was funny.

I tried to tell people about
this feeling, adults, my
worker and teachers.

But I didn’t have the words
others would understand.
I had the emotion though,
and I felt the pain even
deeper.

As a child I didn’t see it
coming from my dad, at
first.

The violence was from my
brothers. I guess it was
learnt.

Mum was drinking but
my brothers needed a
different way to cope.

I guess taking it out on
their little sister was all
they had, with no reason
for hope.

As I got older, I didn’t want
to take it anymore.

My dad hit me so bad, I
screamed and that was
the final straw.

I tried running away from
dad. Face the world on my
own.

But the police picked me
up and took me straight
back. If only they would
have known.

When you don’t hear
from children and young
people you miss stories
just like mine.

We need to speak our own
words, in our own way.
Listen, involve us, not once
but every time.