Steve Price’s pointed question to Grace Tame as she doubles down on the PM on The Project

Steve Price has made a rather frosty point to Grace Tame as she doubled down on the PM after his speech at a women’s safety summit.

Scott Morrison’s decision to read out testimonies from sexual assault survivors as part of his keynote speech at the Australian Women’s Safety Summit sparked immediate outrage.

The Prime Minister voiced the confronting stories as part of his opening speech to kick off the two-day online conference on Monday in a move that was quickly criticised, with Australian of the Year and sexual assault survivor Grace Time leading the backlash.

“Scott has just finished his opening keynote address … in which he appropriated private disclosures from survivors to leverage his own image,” Ms Tame wrote on Twitter.

Following up on her stance in an interview with The Project on Monday night, Tame was pressed by co-host Steve Price who pointed out that her response to the PM’s speech “rightly or wrongly” shrouded any positives to come from the summit.

“Rightly or wrongly, the negativity has been focused on today, with most people reporting about what you said about the Prime Minister, rather than what was achieved at the summit,” Price pointedly said to Tame.

Tame was quick to respond, saying: “Look, that may be, but I think it is more important than anything else that we remember, ultimately, we do have to put our differences aside and we have to work together to create actual change, actual structural change here, as a united force.”

The 26-year-old added: “Yes, I did have some personal issues with the way that the Prime Minister used survivors’ stories not on their terms, which is completely unethical, but we have to focus on the positives.”

Grace Tame on The Project. Picture: Channel 10

The summit is aimed at shaping policies around ending violence against women and children, with the PM declaring the domestic violence rate a “national shame”.

During his speech, Mr Morrison made reference to the government’s reaction to Brittany Higgins’ complaint that she had been allegedly sexually assaulted by a staffer in Parliament House in 2019.

Mr Morrison said Ms Higgins’ allegations over the government response had prompted conversations about “longstanding and serious failings in this Parliament House” that had “turned into a conversation about women’s experiences everywhere”.

“Right now, too many women do not feel safe, and too often, they are not safe and that is not OK,” Mr Morrison said.

“There is no excuse, and sorry doesn’t cut it.

“They are not safe at home, they are not safe at work, in broad daylight … in public spaces.

“Here in this place, even this place where I speak to you from today, you are not always safe.

“Australia does have a problem. There is still an attitude, a culture that excuses and justifies, ignores or condones gender inequality. And that is on all of us.”

Prime Minister Scott Morrison at the National Summit on Women's Safety. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Gary Ramage

The Project host Waleed Aly asked Tame why she believed significant change was yet to happen despite a much louder conversation and an increase in government-funded school programs over the last few years.

Tame argued the government was failing to prioritise prevention and education, referencing the $1.1 billion investment into women’s safety which was announced in the federal budget in May, saying only $35 million had been allocated to primary prevention.

“Although there has been some attention put on primary prevention it is still not the main focus. When you look at the $1.1 billion that has been injected into the issue of women’s safety, only $35 million has been put into primary prevention,” she said.

“And if we look at the program Respect Matters – that’s for consent education – originally that was only $2.8 million in 2019 and that was for a three-year period, and then in the 2020 education, skills and employment budget statement, that amount of $2.8 million was inexplicably slashed to $1.36 million for the same three-year period.

“As my friend pointed out, if you divide $1.63 million by three million students enrolled across the nation you get 11 cents per student and you can’t even buy a milkshake for 11 cents.

Grace Tame on The Project. Picture: Channel 10

Tame added, “As frustrated as I was by the hypocrisies, by the insensitivity towards survivors, by the platitudes, I don’t want to focus on the negatives.

“This is ultimately a time stamp. The entire nation is watching and the government has an opportunity to listen and learn to all of the asks, all of the major themes, that come up from this summit, that have come up already, and that will come up tomorrow and we can only hope that those things are applied.”

Both Higgins and Tame are attending the summit, which continues on Tuesday.