The change could happen in my lifetime: Trialling a new Safe at Home response

Changing our collective mindset to keep women and children safe in their own homes

by Jocelyn Bignold OAM – CEO McAuley Community Service for Women

This article was originally published in Council to Homeless Persons’ Parity magazine – July 2025.

For decades, we have accepted the default narrative that women and children must flee their homes to be safe from family violence. This system evolved from an era where there was no choice but to hide victim survivors away. However, the cost of this approach is high and borne largely by women and children who all too often end up homeless.

In Australia, family violence is the largest driver of people seeking assistance from specialist homelessness services. In 2023-24, 109,500 clients (39% of all clients) had experienced family and domestic violence, and the majority were women and children. (1)

When women and children leave their homes to escape violence they also leave behind their community, their connections, their schools and workplaces. The effects of this upheaval can be traumatic and long-lasting. Keeping victim survivors safe in their homes, schools and communities is a state and federal government priority. We were keen to see what we could do to stem the flow into homelessness and find better ways of keeping victim survivors safe at home while actively disrupting the violence.

We are now excited to begin a trial of a new Safe at Home response in Victoria’s Geelong and Barwon region. Launched in March this year and funded by the Victorian Government, the three-year trial is being run by McAuley Community Services for Women in partnership with Meli, Westjustice and Barwon Community Legal Centre.

This is the first time a Safe at Home response has combined early, integrated services for the whole household, with support offered to each family member separately.

Codesigning a new model

The aim of the Safe at Home trial in the Geelong and Barwon region is to test the key components research has shown are needed for a comprehensive local approach, then seek to have them incorporated into Safe at Home responses across Australia.

Getting to this stage has involved years of research, collaboration, consultation and advocacy. This included looking at what had been done around the world and closer to home (2) and working with University of Melbourne researchers to evaluate Victoria’s Personal Safety Initiative (PSI) as part of the Safe at Home: Research, Barriers and Access (SHEBA) Project. (3) Key components identified in the National Safe at Home Operational Framework (4) were confirmed in the SHEBA report and we have purposely incorporated these elements into the trial.

Codesigned by victim survivors, people who had previously used violence, frontline workers, sector experts and researchers, we have a service delivery model for the trial incorporating:

Earlier intervention and faster response times

Flexible, longer-term support for up to two years that responds to changing needs

A whole-of-household approach through personalised, coordinated responses

Centrally coordinated access to a range of supports including case management, legal and financial assistance, counselling and practical help like obtaining home security upgrades

Support for children and young people as separate clients

Support and accountability for the person using violence, including help to find alternative accommodation where required

Help to build the household’s economic capacity and prevent homelessness

In combining these elements, our aim is to prevent homelessness and preserve housing, jobs, school and community connections for women and their children who are experiencing family violence. We also want to assist those who use violence to stop and get the support that they may also need, which is likely to include being removed from the house.

Mapping the system

Developing a deep understanding of the system-level enablers and barriers to a Victorian Safe at Home response was a critical piece of early work. We commissioned First Person Consulting to help us create a systems map in consultation with stakeholders. We worked together to identify leverage points within existing systems, and areas of potential intervention that would support whole-of-system impact to keep women and children safe and avoid homelessness.

We know that there is no “one size fits all” approach, and each person’s experience within the system is shaped by many factors including gender, race, class, education, ability, citizenship, sexuality and age.

How important is economic stability?

The systems mapping exercise provided many useful insights, including highlighting the importance of economic security.

People using violence can control or sabotage women’s access to financial resources, including their employment. They can prevent women from accessing employment at all, or they can make it very difficult for them to be a reliable employee if they do have work.

Recent research (5) shows significant education and employment ‘gaps’ between women who have experienced family violence and those who have not. The experience of family violence means “large numbers of women have not attained a degree, have left the labour force, have reduced their working hours, or have taken time off work.” (6)

As noted, one of the integral components of a successful Safe at Home response is access to support to build the household’s economic capacity. We may help victim survivors be safe in their homes but if they cannot afford to stay there the risk of homelessness remains, and there is a higher likelihood of their return to a violent relationship. Through the trial we will address this risk factor by actively working with employers in the Geelong and Barwon region to assist women to find suitable employment and access financial support. We will also be investigating the conditions that would assist employers to consider employing people who have, or are, using violence.

How do we intervene earlier?

One of the most important aspects of the Safe at Home response is the early intervention focus, which victim survivors have clearly asked for. People need to know that staying safely at home can be an option for them, and that support is available earlier than the stage when a crisis response becomes necessary.

We know we need to respond earlier, but how? When is the right time? How do we reach them, when perhaps they are not even consciously aware that they are experiencing family violence? We have built community connections work into the trial design so that we can start to identify those who could benefit from a response earlier. We’ll be connecting with maternal child health nurses, banks, utility companies, GPs, kindergartens, schools and community groups in Geelong and the Barwon region to try to find those earlier moments.

Victim survivors are also showing us the way. Reflecting on the story of Diana, McAuley’s Lived Experience Consultant, who has also contributed her own article to this edition of Parity, we were able to see opportunities where – had a Safe at Home response existed – we may have been able to intervene earlier and prevent her and her children becoming homeless.

Changing our collective mindset

The Safe at Home trial will test whether we can shift the prevailing narrative that women must leave. This will largely depend on keeping women and children safe, giving them the financial security to retain their housing and holding people who use violence to account.

It will also require the building of trust in this new approach, and an acceptance that challenges are inevitable, and part of learning the process, because we haven’t done this before.

With a dedicated team now in place and strategic partnerships in the local community, we have the capacity to support 54 households in the Geelong and Barwon region. It is both exciting and daunting, as we seek to draw on the collective knowledge of our sector while also challenging established systems, including our own routine ways of working and ingrained attitudes.

Changing our system to one that keeps women and children safely at home will require a lot of collaboration, trust, perseverance and a willingness to think outside the box. After a long career working with women affected by violence, it makes me excited and hopeful to think that I might see that change in my lifetime.

References

‘Specialist homelessness services annual report 2023-24′, Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 2024, <https://www.aihw.gov.au/getmedia/ace25f78-a68b-43ee-a4a9-cafd145408b9/specialist-homelessness-services-annual-report-2023-24.pdf?v=20250424143747&inline=true>
Breckenridge, J., Chung, D., Spinney, A., & Zuffery, C., 2015, ‘National mapping and meta-evaluation outlining key features of effective “safe at home” programs that enhance safety and prevent homelessness for women and their children who have experienced domestic and family violence’, ANROWS Landscapes: State of Knowledge, Issue 5/July 2015, <https://anrows-2019.s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/19024809/final-5_3.1-Landscapes-SafeAtHome-29-7-2015-1.pdf
Isobe, J., Diemer, K., Humphreys, C., & De Silva, H. (2024) ‘Safe at Home: Experiences, Barriers, and Access (The SHEBA Project): Research Report’. The University of Melbourne, <https://vawc.com.au/sheba-research-report/>
Gendered Violence Research Network UNSW, ‘Safe at Home Operational Framework’, Department of Social Services, 2021, <https://plan4womenssafety.dss.gov.au/implementation-plan/safe-at-home-operational-framework/>
Summers, A., Shortridge, T. & Sobeck, K. (2025). ‘The Cost of Domestic Violence to Women’s Employment and Education’. University of Technology Sydney. <https://doi.org/10.71741/4pyxmbnjaq.28489736.v3>
Summers, A. Shortridge, T. & Sobeck, K. (2025), Ibid. p.15