SEQURE CONSULTING

Seeking help in their own right: Examining how Victorian young people access help when escaping family violence

In Australia, at the national and state level, there is increasing acknowledgement of the need to better respond to young people as victim-survivors of family violence in their own right. The recently released National Plan to end Violence against Women and Children 2022-2032 embeds this acknowledgement, and there have been calls at the state and national level to ensure that early intervention and system responses are reformed to ensure age-appropriate and child-centred practices.

Despite the high prevalence of family violence experienced by children and young people in Victoria, little is known about how different points of the service system intersect to respond to children as victim- survivors in their own right.

You can access the Report here

Project aims and design

Focusing specifically on young people’s experiences of accessing supports at the point of crisis, this project:

Mapped existing services available for, and accessed by young people when escaping family violence,
Built the evidence base on young people’s experiences of accessing crisis supports in Victoria, and mapped from the perspective of the young people interviewed.
Investigated what is needed to improve the capacity of the family violence service system to meet the needs of young people experiencing and escaping family violence.

Where possible, the project considered how the support needs and experiences of accessing services may differ among young people from a range of backgrounds and communities, including for young people with disability, who identify as LGBTIQA+, First Nations young people, and for young people from regional and rural communities, and culturally and racially diverse communities.

For this project, data was collected across three stages:

While the data collected for this project was Victorian specific, the findings have policy and practice relevance for all Australian states and territories.

Key Findings and Recommended Actions

Despite the substantial reform agenda that has been progressed in the nearly ten years since the Royal Commission into Family Violence (RCFV, 2016), the family violence service system in Victoria remains predominantly adult-centric and often fails to recognise young people as victim-survivors in their own right. Critical gaps persist in ensuring young people – particularly unaccompanied minors – can access safe housing, specialist support services, and clear pathways that support their stability, healing and recovery.

Any system that requires children to be at breaking point before acting is not a system that is keeping them safe. Key findings within this study relate to:

The impact of information gaps and delayed attempts to seek help

The challenges young victim-survivors face when navigating adult-centric services

The sense of invisibility and mistrust that characterises young victim-survivors experiences of seeking help at the point of crisis

How crisis-drive response systems leave young people unsupported until the point of crisis

Out of home care placements often compound trauma

Schools are missing opportunities to provide early interventions

This study builds on recent research to reveal the missed opportunities to support the help-seeking needs of young victim-survivors and to intervene earlier. Substantive practice reform and innovation is needed to reflect the policy commitments that have been made to acknowledge children and young people as victim-survivors in their own right.

Project Team

Project Lead

Dr Kate Fitz-Gibbon

Project Advisory Group

This project is supported by an expert advisory group. Members of the project advisory group include:

Tracy Adams (CEO, yourtown)
Rosie Batty AO (Family Violence Prevention Advocate, Australian of the Year 2015)
Liana Buchanan (Victorian Commissioner for Children and Young People)
Assistant Commissioner Lauren Callaway (Family Violence Command, Victoria Police)
Conor Pall (Advocate and Author)
Chelsea Tobin(CEO Safe Steps)

Acknowledgements

Thank you to the children and young people who generously shared their experiences, insights, and reflections for this study. This research would not have been possible without your courage, honesty, and vision for change, which form the heart of this report.

We also acknowledge the service providers and frontline practitioners who supported the recruitment process by facilitating connections with young victim-survivors. Their assistance was vital in ensuring that the voices of young victim-survivors were heard and centred in this work.

Dr Rebecca Stewart provided research assistance to support earlier stages of this study.

This report draws in part on interview data from the I Believe You project (2023, Victorian Government funded), which was co-authored with Dr Jasmine McGowan and Dr Rebecca Stewart.

Project Funding

This project is funded by Safe Steps Family Violence Response Centre.