Orana House - Conversations That Matter

INTRODUCTION AND DOROTHY TANGNEY

Orana means welcome in Wiradjuri.

And for 45 years, you have been welcoming women and children through your doors.

The Albanese Government is proud to support you.

In 1943, the Parliament welcomed the first women through its doors.

Women for the first time, were sharing their lived experience in the halls of power.

One of those women was Dorothy Tangney, the first woman elected to the Australian Senate.

Dorothy Tangney was a woman who believed in the power of policy to uplift the lives of everyone.

She knew this because she had experienced hardship in her own childhood.

Not because of violence, but because of poverty.

Incredibly bright, she won a scholarship to the prestigious St Joseph’s School.

There was just one problem.

Her family didn’t have the money to pay for her new school uniform.

So a young Dorothy sold raffle tickets every day – underage – until she had enough money to buy her uniform herself.

Dorothy Tangney knew what it was like to have the deck stacked against you.

And how hard it is to fight for a better life.

In her 25 years in the Senate, she was part of some transformative conversations and some important policy work.

Conversations about women, and family and domestic life.

She campaigned strongly for the use of Federal powers to improve social services and housing.

She left the Senate in the 1960s, heading back home to Perth for good.

To a city radically different to the one in which she had first stood for Parliament.

ORIGINS OF ORANA HOUSE

The 1960s and 1970s were a period of great change across Perth.

1978 was a particularly important year for Western Australia.

Somewhere in Perth, a new band called the Triffids were writing their first songs.

And a small, since-forgotten movie called Grease was playing at Perth cinemas.

Skylab was still in orbit, still a year away from crashing down in regional WA.

And two Perth icons, Timezone and Fast Eddy’s, had both opened their doors for the first time.

Birthday parties for Perth pre-teens would never be the same.

Also opening its doors was Orana Women’s Refuge, in two old houses on Aberdeen Street in Northbridge.

Your organisation saw a gap in services that wasn’t being addressed by government.

And so you took matters into your own hands.

Supporting women in Perth in crisis situations.

In 1989, you decided to become your own organisation, with your own constitution and management committee

You can imagine how ground-breaking that was for its time, when boardrooms and organisations were full of men in suits and ties, and clouds of cigarette smoke.

A committee of passionate women wanting to get stuff done.

Doing it because someone had to.

Doing it because it was the right thing to do.

PATRICIA GILES

It was just a year later in 1990 that a fellow Western Australian received a landmark appointment from then-Prime Minister Bob Hawke.

Like Dorothy Tangney, Patricia Giles was a Senator representing Western Australian women in Canberra.

She was appointed Special Parliamentary Adviser to the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister on Violence Against Women.

She campaigned against the fact that this issue, in her view, had been “trivialised.”

Before she was Senator Giles, Patricia Giles had been a nurse.

She had seen up close the physical and mental toll that violence takes.

Nurse Giles had been there with women as they struggled to pick up the pieces.

She had also been heavily involved in school parents’ and citizens’ organisations, at the intersection of community and family life.

With her background in healthcare, she knew that not every child comes from a happy or even safe home.

She often spoke in Parliament about:

“…burdens and disadvantages previously adjudged to be restricted to the 'private' realm, now accepted as community concerns and responsibilities.”

It is no wonder she advocated passionately in Parliament for centres like yours.

She understood the value of what an organisation like Orana House adds to our community.

Upon her death in 2017, her daughter, Anne, said that her mother had:

“… an extraordinary ability to get people together to achieve things without a lot of fuss.”

Bringing people together is how we make real change.

Change that ultimately improves lives.

I see the importance of coordination among all of those gathered here today, and the work that you do.

Approaching this challenge as the “community responsibility” it is.

Because we know that this problem is persistent and present today.

FAMILY AND DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AND THE WORK OF ORANA HOUSE

That brings us to 2023.

Orana House has changed premises a few times over the years.

But what hasn’t changed is the consistent challenge of family and domestic violence.

What unites us today is our commitment to addressing a very present problem.

In Western Australia alone, 64 per cent of assaults relate to family and domestic violence.

Across Australia, on average, one woman is killed every 14 days by an intimate partner.

This year, 53 women have lost their lives.

That is more than one woman each week.

I know many in this room know these numbers, but that doesn’t lessen the horror of what they mean.

Last month, six women died within 10 days.

Alice McShera here in Perth.

Lilie James in Sydney.

And far too many others.

This problem is not resigned to history.

It is facing us right now.

These women had lives and futures.

They had people around them who loved them and will miss them.

They had a right to be safe. 

They are the reason that this conversation matters.

In our homes, in our communities, and in our workplaces.

As your motto says:

“everyone deserves to live free from family and domestic violence.”

When it comes to addressing this national problem, I know that we are far from solving it yet.

What we can do, as a Government, is recognise what is working well in places like Orana House.

I know you embrace the concept of wraparound services, even urging real estate agents to help survivors into their own homes.

I know your SWitCH Centre in Bayswater meets women where they’re at.

Supporting women in a holistic way.

Connecting them to counselling, medical care, legal advice, whatever they need.

There are many steps to helping survivors leave an abusive situation safely, heal from the trauma and start over.

Orana House knows this.

You support victim survivors through all the avenues that you can.

Making sure that as an organisation you are able to improve lives, despite the wide-ranging impacts violence can have.

But a single organisation cannot tackle a national problem alone.

ADDRESSING THE PROBLEM

Australia needs to have this conversation.

There is no better time than now, two days out from 25 November.

Saturday marks the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women.

It is also the start of “16 days in WA,” our state’s campaign to eliminate violence against women.

The Albanese Government is working towards the only acceptable outcome there is: the elimination of gender-based violence entirely, within one generation.

We are developing the nation’s first ever National Strategy to Achieve Gender Equality.

To shift attitudes on gender stereotypes.

To reform the institutions and systems that excuse, justify or promote violence.

And to make Australia a society where men and women have equal choice and opportunity, free from violence.

We have made the safety of women and children a long-term, national priority.

With a record investment of $2.3 billion across the two most recent Budgets.

And a 10-year National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children.

We have amended the Fair Work Act to include 10 days’ paid family and domestic violence leave.

Workers should not have to choose between their safety and their wages.

This legislation will save lives.

Importantly, we continue our aim to prevent violence.

By delivering respectful relationships education in schools.

And supporting Our Watch and the ‘Stop it at the Start’ campaign.

We are also delivering the single biggest investment in affordable and social housing in more than a decade.

This will provide $100 million for crisis and transitional housing for women and children experiencing violence and older women at risk of homelessness.

But I know our government stands on the shoulders of giants.

People like Pat and Dorothy and all of you here today.

Those who speak up to put the prevention of family and domestic violence at the centre of the national conversation.

Those who stand up to represent members of our community who are far too often silenced.

To improve women’s safety we need to coordinate our approach.

To establish referral pathways that are clearer and more easily understood.

Providing support that is timely, safe, inclusive and accessible.

The Albanese Government is working closely with states and territories to address service gaps.

We have allocated more than $49 million to bolster frontline services here in Western Australia.

Helping women wherever they are.

Because none of us can do this if we try to do it alone.

CONCLUSION

Addressing family and domestic violence is not an easy task.

The work that you are doing for our community is so important.

But there is still so much further for our nation to go.

To see all of us gathered to have this conversation that matters – together – gives me hope.

Coordination and a holistic approach will move us closer to our shared goal of eliminating family and domestic violence.

And this is what Orana House has done so well for decades now.

Thank you for your work.

And thank you for inviting me to be a part of this conversation.

It truly does matter to our government, to our community and to me.

Thank you.