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Speaker 1: We're going to hit into our next interview. Joining me

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Speaker 1: on the line is the Minister for Domestic Family and

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Speaker 1: Sexual Violence, Robin Karl.

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Speaker 2: Good morning, Minister, Good morning, Katie, good morning too. Listens

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Speaker 2: and so pleased to hear that things are moving along

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Speaker 2: and are very relieved that there were no injuries from

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Speaker 2: the cyclone. Yeah, great job Territorians. Everybody's pitching in, which

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Speaker 2: is what we do.

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Speaker 1: On everybody helping each other out as well, Robin, which

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Speaker 1: is really nice.

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Speaker 2: It is it's ants and it's who we are, it's

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Speaker 2: what we do, and it's a reminder to everybody just

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Speaker 2: what makes this place so special.

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Speaker 1: It really is, hey, Robin. A big announcement a little

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Speaker 1: earlier this morning. The government's going to be quadrupling the

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Speaker 1: length of band drinker orders, with the Chief Minister saying

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Speaker 1: the move is backed by the police community. So what

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Speaker 1: it's going to mean is that, well, they're going to

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Speaker 1: move from seven day band drinker orders to twenty eight

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Speaker 1: days from next month. What do you reckon this bdr

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Speaker 1: change is going to mean?

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Speaker 2: Okay, it's pretty significant. I think that what we've seen

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Speaker 2: and will everybody is seen over a period of time

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Speaker 2: that that seven day band just simply wasn't long enough.

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Speaker 2: If you think about people even starting to think about

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Speaker 2: changing behavior, nobody can do it in seven days. So

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Speaker 2: through discussions with police the review that was undertaking, it

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Speaker 2: was a very strong recommendation that we move that to

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Speaker 2: twenty eight days because it just gives a much better

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Speaker 2: breathing space and gives a greater opportunity for us to

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Speaker 2: get some of those problem drinkers the support and help

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Speaker 2: that they need now.

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Speaker 1: Robin in terms of you know, the alcohol orders and

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Speaker 1: them increasing, how do you think that that may help

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Speaker 1: in terms of the level of domestic violence that we're

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Speaker 1: seeing across the Northern Territory as well.

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Speaker 2: I think anything that has contributing to domestic violence we

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Speaker 2: absolutely should be tackling head on. And as we're moving

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Speaker 2: into the crisis period, holiday periods are always really, really

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Speaker 2: difficult when it comes to family domestic violence, So anything

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Speaker 2: we can do that can reduce the potential to trigger

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Speaker 2: a violent episode is absolutely critical. And obviously we're not

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Speaker 2: saying that all people in family situations are problem drinkers,

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Speaker 2: but we certainly know there's a very strong correlation between

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Speaker 2: escalation of violence in a domestic situation and alcohol. So

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Speaker 2: this should really give us a good opportunity to break

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Speaker 2: the cycle of violence that's been happening and move in

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Speaker 2: more quickly to help these people, the victims, and get

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Speaker 2: perpetrators into programs that they need to do to look

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Speaker 2: at changing behavior.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, are we going to then see a bit of

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Speaker 1: an increase in some of those programs as well, you know,

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Speaker 1: like some of the alcohol issues programs potentially, because it's

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Speaker 1: one thing for people to not be able to drink,

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Speaker 1: but like you touched on there, if you can break

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Speaker 1: that cycle and not only have them not drinking for

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Speaker 1: twenty eight days, but potentially you know, making some serious

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Speaker 1: changes to their lives, surely that'd be a good thing.

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Speaker 2: And I know Minister Edgington as a responsible minister, as

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Speaker 2: working very hard with his team to look at how

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Speaker 2: we can create greater opportunity for people to get into

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Speaker 2: programs where the trigger point would be to make program mandatory.

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Speaker 2: And really the educational piece around alcohol is not the answer.

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Speaker 2: Alcohol is something that we all enjoy. If it's something

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Speaker 2: that's a problem for you and you need help, we

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Speaker 2: will be there to help you. And hopefully that twenty

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Speaker 2: eight day period where people will have a greater opportunity

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Speaker 2: to sober up, they'll start to realize that they need

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Speaker 2: some help.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, hey, Robin, I do want to ask you as

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Speaker 1: well about the launch of the Domestic Family Sexual Violence

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Speaker 1: Reduction Strategy twenty five to twenty eight. It's and also

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Speaker 1: a Safety ROADBAP to coincide with the start of the

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Speaker 1: global sixteen Days of Activism campaign. How is this plan

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Speaker 1: going to reduce the horrific rates of DV that we

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Speaker 1: continue to see across the Northern Territory.

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Speaker 2: Well, the good news, Katie, is that many of these

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Speaker 2: programs have already started it because the funding came out

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Speaker 2: and we wanted to make sure that we got that

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Speaker 2: thirty six million dollars allocated as quickly as possible, and

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Speaker 2: we gave security to programs that were already in play.

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Speaker 2: And I'm really happy to report that I had been

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Speaker 2: hoping that we would start to see a plateauing of

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Speaker 2: domestic violence across the territory my target day twenty thirty.

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Speaker 2: As of the end of September, we've seen a decrease

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Speaker 2: in domestic violence assault across the territory of one point

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Speaker 2: four percent. So that is a small percentage, but when

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Speaker 2: you think that I was hoping for a plateauing by

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Speaker 2: twenty thirty. It's incredibly significant, and we're seeing the greatest

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Speaker 2: inroads in the Alice Springs area, where we've had a

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Speaker 2: combination of programs, most importantly the Circuit Breaker program, which

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Speaker 2: is about to celebrate its first year of operation, where

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Speaker 2: there's been a huge amount of work done with families

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Speaker 2: where domestic violence and alcohol have been issues, and that's

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Speaker 2: one of the reasons the kids have been not at

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Speaker 2: home when they should be. The work that's been done

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Speaker 2: by that team, the wrap around services, the stepping in

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Speaker 2: and actually getting people redirected to other services and where necessary,

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Speaker 2: moving them into safe environments, is really starting to make

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Speaker 2: changes in that community's approach. And then if you combine

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Speaker 2: that with the mandatory remand of people who breach a DBO,

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Speaker 2: this culmination of all of the things that we've put

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Speaker 2: in place to look at protecting victims and also breaking

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Speaker 2: that cycle of violence, we are actually starting to see

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Speaker 2: us chip away at what's been happening in that space.

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Speaker 2: So I appreciate its early days, but it's pretty exciting

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Speaker 2: and I'm looking at it going this is an outcome

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Speaker 2: we can measure when we talk about these programs often,

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Speaker 2: and it's not the fault of the programs, but the

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Speaker 2: previous government was very output focused, so it was like,

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Speaker 2: how many people have you seen? How many places have

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Speaker 2: you gone? It didn't really look at Okay, you saw

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Speaker 2: a thousand people. Of those thousand people, how many of

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Speaker 2: them have changed their behavior? How many of them are

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Speaker 2: no longer at risk? How many of them are now

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Speaker 2: living full and productive life free of domestic violence? So

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Speaker 2: we're really focusing on outcomes. We really wanted to make

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Speaker 2: sure we got it right. There was extensive consultation on

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Speaker 2: this particular strategy, and I was absolutely it was not

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Speaker 2: negotiable with the Department of Children's and Families that we

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Speaker 2: needed KPIs that were measurable and were target outcomes, not

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Speaker 2: just numbers of people through the program.

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Speaker 1: Robin, what do you say to those that are still

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Speaker 1: sort of on the other side of the fence here?

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Speaker 1: I know that I watched the ABC News last night

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Speaker 1: and they had one of the domestic violence experts on

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Speaker 1: the who you know who wasn't entirely convinced that the

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Speaker 1: changes that the government's making having an impact. Like, what

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Speaker 1: do you say to those people? Because it feels like

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Speaker 1: you're trying to think outside the box or do things

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Speaker 1: a little bit differently to what we have previously done.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, well, what I say to those people, they want

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Speaker 2: us to keep doing the same thing over and over

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Speaker 2: and over, and we've been doing the same thing over

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Speaker 2: and over for at least two decades in the territory.

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Speaker 2: It is not working. We saw an eighty one percent

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Speaker 2: increase of domestic violence assaults over ten years under the

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Speaker 2: previous government. We have been in government for fifteen months

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Speaker 2: and we have already made an inroad into assaults. The

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Speaker 2: progress that's been made, I'm really I don't know why

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Speaker 2: the people who are working in this space aren't celebrating that,

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Speaker 2: because they should be. Perhaps they just haven't caught up

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Speaker 2: with the facts yet. But the reality is we are

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Speaker 2: making differences and to me, I've said to all organizations,

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Speaker 2: including Department of Children's and Family, success would look like

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Speaker 2: none of us had a job, which would be amazing,

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Speaker 2: But the reality is that's never going to happen. So

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Speaker 2: what we want to be able to do is reduce

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Speaker 2: the pressure on those services, and the best way to

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Speaker 2: reduce the pressure is to solve the problem before it starts.

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Speaker 2: And that is why we are focusing on breaking the

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Speaker 2: cycle of violence and the victim perpetrator approach. At that

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Speaker 2: point in time when children have an opportunity to understand

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Speaker 2: that a violent relationship is not normal, that young girls

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Speaker 2: don't think that you their partner, exhibiting violence to them

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Speaker 2: is a way of showing that they care about them.

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Speaker 2: We absolutely have to change that behavior and that understanding

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Speaker 2: and get in there and give those kids the best

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Speaker 2: possible chance, and at the same time work with the

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Speaker 2: people who are already in that cycle and trapped in

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Speaker 2: a system and a relationship. There is really difficult to

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Speaker 2: make sure we can protect them. So we need to

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Speaker 2: look after the pointy end, if you like, the crisis point.

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Speaker 2: But we can't just focus on that. And unfortunately, what

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Speaker 2: I hear often out of the sector, the people who

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Speaker 2: talk publicly is from that crisis side of things. I

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Speaker 2: have to tell you talking to many many of the

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Speaker 2: NGO organizations that I do talk to who are working

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Speaker 2: on through the whole spec of how do we stop

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Speaker 2: this FI call. Yes we have to look after victims.

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Speaker 2: Yes we have to deal with perpetrators and change their behavior,

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Speaker 2: but we must change things and do things differently. I

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Speaker 2: am incredibly reassured at the significant number of organizations who

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Speaker 2: are on board with this and are working side by

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Speaker 2: side with the Department to make this happen.

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Speaker 1: Robin really quickly before I let you go, because I

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Speaker 1: know you've got to get into Parliament. But last night,

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Speaker 1: of course Parliament in Parliament the Integrity and Ethics Commissioner Bill,

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Speaker 1: a major overhaul, merging the IKAK, the Ombudsman, the Information

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Speaker 1: Commissioner and the Health Complaints Commissioner into one independent watchdog.

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Speaker 1: Will it passed, as I understand it, the Opposition saying

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Speaker 1: that they're just a bit concerned that maybe this is

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Speaker 1: a cost saving exercise. Is it?

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Speaker 2: No, absolutely not, and it's a bit rich really coming

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Speaker 2: from the opposition. They are in government. They put this

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Speaker 2: system in place. It's been an absolute disaster. The KAC

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Speaker 2: Commissioner as it stood, it's costs the territory thirty five

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Speaker 2: million dollars. It did not give the results that they

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Speaker 2: claimed it would. So what we did was we got

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Speaker 2: experts to look at what was happening, how could we

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Speaker 2: improve it, how could we make this So this absolutely

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Speaker 2: did the job that it was meant to do, and

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Speaker 2: the results of that was the legislation that came to

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Speaker 2: Parliament last night and were passed.

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Speaker 1: Well, Robin Carl will let you go. Always appreciate your time.

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Speaker 1: Thank you very much for having a chat with me.

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Speaker 2: Thanks Kat, It's always good to chat.

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Speaker 1: Thank you, Thanks so much for your time