00:00Look, it is an encouraging sign.
00:04Obviously one of the big concerns when the legislation was brought in as May was that
00:09it was not going to be prosecuted because of evidentiary issues or others, that women
00:13wouldn't see the justice that they were seeking, but that hasn't been our experience so far.
00:17Can you remind us what coercive control is?
00:20Of course.
00:22And of course coercive control isn't where we've started using and the offence is quite
00:25new, but unfortunately the behaviours that make up coercive control have been around
00:29for a long time.
00:30So really when we think about those behaviours there's four kinds of things they're seeking
00:34to do.
00:35So coercive control is repeated behaviours that hurt, humiliate, isolate or frighten someone
00:42in order to control them.
00:43So you're happy with the number of charges, happy is perhaps the wrong word, number of
00:47charges in Queensland on this so far.
00:50Is the number of victims coming forward reflective though of the true number of people who experience
00:55coercive control?
00:56Tragically no.
00:58What we know from the thousands of women we see every year is that coercive control sits
01:02under much of the domestic and family violence we see in our state.
01:05So we know we see about 45,000 domestic violence orders a year and that is nowhere near the number
01:11of reports we would expect to see.
01:13So 50 charges of coercive control, any convictions so far?
01:17There have been two as we understand it, which is encouraging.
01:21And I think much of this is just about public awareness and seeing that people are being
01:26held to account for these really harmful behaviours.
01:28So there is more awareness then among people about what coercive control is and whether they
01:33are a victim of it?
01:33That's right.
01:34And I think we've moved a long way to move just away from that physical harm.
01:39Which of course in itself is difficult but people understand more and more about the
01:43other kinds of abuse, so financial abuse, control of where people go, control of social media,
01:49tracking.
01:50There's a lot more awareness about those kinds of behaviours that well and truly sit within
01:54this criminal offence.
01:55Nadia, how hard is coercive control to prove?
01:59Look, unlike physical violence, coercive control is more difficult to prove because we need
02:04to establish a course of conduct so it's about gathering evidence over time and showing
02:08that pattern of behaviour.
02:10But people are getting better that things are people can do so they can collect financial
02:14records, they can keep text messages, they can take screenshots of social media and people
02:18are becoming more aware that although it is harmful and traumatic to keep these records,
02:24that's the way that prosecutions can succeed.
02:26And is that where more training by authorities is needed for them to identify the signs and
02:32then be better at collecting that evidence to present in court?
02:36Absolutely.
02:37And look, we all have a role to play so certainly agencies can get better about identifying when
02:43coercive control is being committed, by whom it's being committed and supporting people
02:47to make sure those prosecutions are successful.
02:49But also in the community it's about calling out behaviour and supporting people we think might
02:54need help if they're in a coercive relationship.
02:56Is there also an issue of manipulation of the system by alleged perpetrators that they can
03:02turn situations around and that authorities need to be able to identify such situations?
03:08There certainly is and we know that there have been issues in our state and across the country
03:13in the misidentification of victims as the people who are perpetrators of violence.
03:18And that happens for a range of reasons but given this is such a serious criminal offence
03:22with a 14 year penalty of imprisonment as a maximum, it's so important that care is taken
03:27to train those people responding to violence and to train those prosecuting to make sure
03:31that the right people are being held to account for their behaviour.
03:34So we've been talking about the number of coercive control charges laid in Queensland.
03:39What's happening in other parts of the country?
03:42We mentioned New South Wales a moment ago and I note that today the Victorian opposition
03:46is introducing a bill to Parliament to criminalise coercive control.
03:51Yes, look across the country it's recognised as a very insidious form of violence and is
03:56prosecuted in different ways.
03:57But as you know, New South Wales and Queensland are the only states so far to have a stand-alone
04:02offence of coercive control.
04:04And certainly initial evidence has suggested that Queensland is one of the most active police
04:08services in upholding that.
04:10Nadia Bromley, thank you so much.
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