Greg Davies: If we can’t keep our kids safe, we’re lost

CHILDREN are the most vulnerable group in our community and if we can’t keep them safe, our society is failing, writes Greg Davies.

ONE of my major roles as Victoria’s first Victims of Crime Commissioner is to advocate on behalf of victims of violent crime. In 37 years as a police officer, I saw the terrible distress that family violence wrought on families and, often, communities. I saw there was one woman killed as a result of family violence every two weeks across Australia.

As a result, I proposed a number of initiatives to governments and later became a White Ribbon ambassador.

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As we know, there has been everything from royal commissions into family violence and child sex abuse, to parliamentary inquiries and various non-government organisations and volunteer groups, all of which were directed at solving the problem.

Distressingly, far from us fixing the issue, the numbers have doubled. Australia now sees one woman, every week, killed as a result of family-related violence.

Yet children are sometimes overlooked in instances of family violence; and on every occasion we should ask ourselves, “why?”. Why do we not put the same, or more, time and energy into protecting our children as we do with any other group? Children are the most vulnerable group in our community. They can’t harness mainstream or social media; they can’t move to another, safer, location if they want; they can’t vote and they can’t understand why someone who is supposed to love and protect them would hurt them, often more than once and, sometimes, fatally.

Children are sometimes overlooked in instances of family violence and we should ask ourselves why?

Well, I can’t understand it either. But neither can I understand how we can truly believe we have done all that we can to prevent murder and violence against children, particularly when we see the assaults continue unabated or, shamefully, increasing in number.

We have tried group therapy, anger management and rehabilitation courses; we have tried to provide more taxpayer-funded support services and we have tried blaming everything and everyone except the offenders.

We seem to be prepared to accept almost any excuse: “He came from a broken home” or “She has learning difficulties” or “They’ve had a lack of opportunities”. If we continue to accept the burgeoning breadth of excuses then we will have to be prepared for a tidal wave of “excusable crime” in the future.

Victims tell me, and I agree, that the time for decisive action is well and truly with us. There can never be a legitimate excuse for murder. Even less so for the murder of a child. No self-defence or assisted suicide claim can ever gain traction where a child is the victim and, if mental illness is an issue, it is up to family, friends, health providers and others to do something positive if there are signs that something is wrong. We all have responsibilities here.

If you think I’m being too harsh, then think of your own children, grandchildren, nephews and nieces. Think of the children of your friends and try to tell yourself that there can be circumstances where it is acceptable that one of them could be murdered, their lives extinguished.

We have no choice but to try something else to hopefully change the current subculture of violence in Victoria.

IN response to a question about what should happen to child murderers from this newspaper’s Ashley Argoon, I said that they should be imprisoned for life. Never to be released, because they have robbed a child of 85 or 90 years of their life. Do we believe convicted child murderers deserve to live among us?

Some will say we should rehabilitate such offenders. To them I say, look at the recidivism rates of our imprisoned criminals. The Ombudsman, and others, have stated that about 45 per cent of prisoners are back in prison within two years of their release. In my experience, if the time period for reincarceration was extended to five years, recidivism numbers might be closer to 70 per cent. Our courts are dealing mainly with repeat customers.

And that means more and more victims.

Blaming everything other than the offender doesn’t work. It’s actually time to recognise that people make choices and there have to be real consequences for criminal actions.

What we are doing isn’t working. We have no choice but to try something else to hopefully change this subculture of violence while we wait for the royal commission recommendations.

I know there are people who absolutely disagree with me on this. That’s largely what democracy is about — free speech.

But if they believe that erecting a sign that says “Dangerous Cliff” will absolve them from responsibility for the dozens who fall, or are pushed, off that cliff every year, then that’s for their conscience, not mine. Because we are talking about the most vulnerable and innocent group of people in Victoria; we are talking about our future.

Let me be perfectly clear. We in Australia, and particularly in Victoria, like to boast how inclusive and accepting we are; how we are one of the safest communities in the world; how everyone has the same human rights and opportunities for success and happiness.

Well, until we can protect our children, until we can provide a reasonable assurance that these defenceless and voiceless people will be allowed to grow and prosper and live lives that are as fulfilling and enjoyable as they deserve to be, then we should stop patting ourselves on the back and instead hang our heads in shame.

Greg Davies APM is a retired police officer, former Secretary of The Police Association and Victoria’s first Victims of Crime Commissioner