By Michael Smith, Eastern Community Legal Centre
Sadly, when community members contact Eastern Community Legal Centre (ECLC) for legal help, family violence is most often the problem they need support with.
In 2022, an alarming 84 per cent of Yarra Ranges residents receiving assistance were experiencing or at risk of family violence.
A key resource in addressing this issue is the work of the Ringwood Court, particularly in considering Family Violence Intervention Order applications, made by from Victoria Police of people directly affected.
A new Specialist Family Violence Court was established at Ringwood in late 2022, but unfortunately ECLC remains extremely concerned that it has only been partially established, with a lack of sufficient resources.
Since Ringwood Court is the closest court to the Yarra Ranges, this lack of funding has a direct effect on victims of family violence in the Yarra Ranges who are seeking help and support at a particularly vulnerable time of their lives.
Although the vision of the Specialist Family Violence Courts to provide easier access to court and promote the “safety of people affected by violence” according to the Magistrates Court of Victoria is, admirable and welcome, the resourcing of the recent Specialist Family Violence Courts established in late October 2022 falls well short of this model.
Unlike the first five Specialist Family Violence Courts locations established in 2019/2020, no increased funding has been provided to Community Legal Centres, including ECLC or to Victoria Legal Aid, despite the increased demand and complexity of the new model.
In October, ECLC extremely reluctantly placed a limit on the number of community members, predominantly women, that the team could assist each day at court. Since then, ECLC has consistently had to turn away people seeking legal advice at Ringwood Magistrates’ Court due to the lack of resources to staff this appropriately.
ECLC will continue to advocate for more funding to be allocated but until this is resolved, family violence victim-survivors who are in the most vulnerable positions, are left unsupported in an already complex and overwhelming system.
Specialist Family Violence Courts were designed to hear intervention order cases at the same time as other matters, including bail applications and pleas in criminal cases, family law parenting order matters and victims of crime applications related to family violence.
Until more funding is provided by the State Government to ECLC and other services, victim survivors in the Yarra Ranges and eastern suburbs will be left unsupported and let down by a system that is supposed to protect them.
