$3.7 million for gender-based violence prevention, intervention

Five organisations leading gender-based violence prevention and early intervention programs will share in a $3.7 million Respect Ballarat community grant pool.

Announced today, the successful organisations are Allied Justice for its Hannah’s Voice program, Cafs (For Baby’s Sake, Primary Connections), Big Brothers Big Sisters Australia (Safe Future Mentoring, Workplace Prevention), City of Ballarat (Baby Makes 3, early years settings lead) and Ballarat Community Health (Equal From The Start, STRONG Trades).

Debbie McGuire, mother of Hannah McGuire who was murdered by her former partner in 2024, said Victoria continued to face a “severe crisis in violence against women, and intimate partner homicide is escalating”.

“Our whole world changed when Hannah was murdered,” she said. “While we don’t know how to move forward without her, we hope that Hannah’s legacy will help end the violence that stole her.”

Today’s announcement built on the 11 initiatives funded through the Ballarat Foundation earlier this year.

Prevention of family violence minister Melissa Horne said she knew her portfolio touched so many people.

“To be able to invest in these innovative programs that have been led by the community is so very important,” she said.

Respect Victoria chief executive officer Helen Bolton said the funding was a significant investment in primary prevention.

“It’s quite a volume that we haven’t seen in Australia before and it attempts to kind of saturate, is the term, mutually reinforcing activities into this area that support prevention and early intervention,” she said.

Bolton said they would have a full evaluation in the next two years about the effectiveness of programs in reducing violence against women, changing community attitudes and forming a blueprint for nation-wide prevention.

She said the funding model is set on a national evidence base of settings, places and people where crime intervention was most effective.

“From that we had a community co-design group here and community connectors who went out to different groups in this community and talked about how is violence showing up and what can be done to help support and prevent that violence occurring,” she said.

Cafs CEO Wendy Sturgess said For Baby’s Sake was an Australian first.

“Ballarat has that opportunity to bring a program that’s unique, working with parents, particularly fathers, and working with two practitioners with families that are known to use violence,” she said.