Margaret McMurdo visits Rockhampton to speak about women in the justice system

Queensland’s first female District Court judge and now chairwoman of the Women’s Safety and Justice Taskforce says “we need to do better” and women are being “let down” when they’re in and come out of prison. READ MORE HERE.

“By ensuring that women have a genuine opportunity to make their full contribution at every level of society, the whole nation, children women and men will be empowered.”

Those were the words spoken by The Honourable Margaret McMurdo AC during her speech on International Women’s Day in 2017 and now she’s putting them into action.

Ms McMurdo was appointed Queensland’s first female District Court Judge in 1991 and now heads the Women’s Safety and Justice Taskforce.

The taskforce was set up in March last year by the state government as an independent consultative group to determine whether coercive control should be criminalised and if domestic violence should be a stand alone criminal offence.

The taskforce recently stopped in Rockhampton and Woorabinda, consulting with stakeholders about women’s experiences of the Queensland Criminal Justice System, including their experiences of the justice system as victims and survivors of sexual assault.

The visit was part of the taskforce’s tour to collect community feedback on women and girls’ experience of sexual violence in the criminal justice system, as well as the experience of women and girls as offenders.

Women's Safety and Justice Taskforce chairwoman Margaret McMurdo was in Rockhampton seeking community feedback on a discussion paper about women and girls experiences in the criminal justice system, both as victim-survivors of sexual violence and also as accused persons and offenders. Picture: Rae Wilson

So far the taskforce has stopped in Mackay, Townsville and Brisbane and already there are many common things they’re hearing in the different areas.

“The reasons why people aren’t reporting sexual assault, there’s some strong themes coming through there,” Ms McMurdo said.

“For women who have had previous contact with police, they’re often frightened to go to police. For women who haven’t had previous contact with police, they’re still reluctant to go to them because they’ve heard from others that the criminal justice system is very tough on women complainants and they’re frightened of the time it’s taken and the re-traumatisation of telling their story over and over again.

“Women with intellectual disabilities are frightened to go to police because they fear they won’t be understood, women are frightened to go to police because they fear they won’t be believed – these are very common stories … so there are a lot of issues there.”

“We’ve learnt from prisons that almost every woman or young women in incarceration has been a victim of domestic and/or sexual violence.”

Ms McMurdo said it was “concerning” to hear so many similar stories.

“We’ve got to do better,” she said.

“In terms of prisons and youth detention centres we’re hearing women and girls, to a large extent, who’ve had considerable disadvantage.

“It could be because of the intergenerational trauma for first nations people, suffering an intellectual disability, drug and alcohol dependency issues, mental health issues or it could be a combination of these things that lead them to the criminal justice system.”

Ms McMurdo said they (the taskforce) had gone to women's prisons around the state and spoken with people, hearing some eye opening stories.

“We are hearing very much a pattern of children who’ve been separated from parents and in the child protection of the state very often then drifting into the youth justice and then the adult criminal justice systems,” she said.

“We’re hearing programs that educative programs that used to be available in prisons aren’t available anymore, we’re hearing prisons can be very hard on women with children or are pregnant and having babies, we learnt for example prisoners and young people in youth detention aren’t eligible for Medicare, which I was pretty shocked to learn that and I think a lot of people would be.

“We’re hearing when they’re coming out they’re not getting the support they should and we’re hearing it’s very hard to women to be reunited with children and find suitable housing.

Margaret McMurdo spoke with stakeholders about women’s experiences of the Queensland Criminal Justice System, including their experiences in the justice system as victims and survivors of sexual assault.

“So often we’re hearing stories of women getting out of prison and not being supported, and are almost set up to fail … these are very vulnerable women who need support in the community to lead a functional life and we’re letting them down.”

Ms McMurdo said while it was understandable people got angry over crime with the belief people should be punished, there needed to be smarter thinking with community money.

“Prisons are extremely expensive for the community, it costs about $130,000 a year to keep someone in prison,” she said.

“So we’re hearing from the Productivity Commission that it just doesn’t make economic sense to keep doing this, we’re much better off spending a lot less money early on to support these people and keep them out of prisons, some people do have to be imprisoned to protect the community undoubtedly, but a lot of these people don’t.

“So if you can spend a lot less money earlier on and a lot less money to support them when they get out, you end up spending a lot less money than putting more people in prison and building more prisons … I think that message is coming through very strongly now.”

Ms McMurdo said it was a “great privilege” to hear the voices of people and present them to the government.

She said the conversations were “terribly important” in regional communities.

“Queensland isn’t just Brisbane and the south east corner, Queensland is different to every other state with its decentralised population,” she said.

“Because of that we’ve got to make sure any policy decisions don’t just reflect life in the south east corner, because it’s quite different to what life is like in a regional city, but even different again to communities like Woorabinda, in the Gulf or the Torres Strait.

“We’ve got to make sure that, somehow, we reach out. Whatever policy is made it has to work for the entire state and get out to the entire state.”

Submissions in response to the taskforce’s discussion paper are open until April 8, with a report delivered to the government by June 30, 2022.

Submissions can be made securely (and confidentially if desired) online at www.womenstaskforce.qld.gov.au

* If anything in this article has brought up concerns, phone DVConnect Womensline on 1800 811 811 (24 hours, 7 days per week), Sexual Assault Helpline on 1800 010 120 (7.30am to 11.30pm, 7 days), or Lifeline on 13 11 44 (24 hours, 7 days).