FIX OUR COURTS
It's time for women and our allies to come together to fix the justice system. Safety should be the norm, not something a woman has to beg and pay for.
Right now, when a woman and her children are in danger, the system makes them run. They flee their home, prove their case, pay for their own safety, and too often lose their children anyway, while the person who caused the harm stays put without accountability.
We're building the opposite. A system where the protective parent and children stay safe and together in their own home, and the person who caused the harm is the one who is moved, monitored, and held to account.
We need you to help build it.
THE THREE PILLARS
1 · A Fourth 000 Emergency Service
A 24/7 domestic, family and sexual violence response unit, led by the frontline specialists who already do this work, with police co-responding in support. It keeps women and children safe at home and relocates the person causing harm. We already have more than 200 frontline services across Australia. They just need the power, funding and system to lead.
2 · A Family Justice and Safety Tribunal
An integrated, inquisitorial, trauma-informed tribunal replacement for the adversarial family court. Decided by a panel of DFSV and child experts, legal, social, cultural and lived-experience, not a lone judge. It keeps children with their primary attachment figure and the parent who safely raised them, holds the person causing harm to account and moves a child only where there is genuine, evidenced risk. It can be piloted within six months.
3 · A Truth and Repair Commission
Modelled on Victoria’s Yoorrook Justice Commission, the survivor led truth-telling process that ran with the full powers of a Royal Commission, but was led by the people who were harmed, for the people who were harmed. A Truth and Repair Commission would do the same for women and children failed by the justice system. It would take testimony in public, build a permanent record that cannot be buried, and compel those with power to answer. Its purpose is not just findings, but repair — redress for those already harmed.
Its first act cannot wait: an urgent review of every case where a child was sent to live with a parent they feared.
Built on Dr Judith Herman's framework — Voice, Validation, Vindication — used with her blessing.
THE ASK
Add your name. Help us build it.
We're not asking permission anymore. We're building the replacement, and it grows with every person who stands with us.
Join the movement, hear what's next, and be part of building One Safe System.
You can also:
Read the full story → https://janinelrees.substack.com/p/how-dare-she
If this raised something hard for you:
1800RESPECT — 1800 737 732
Lifeline — 13 11 14
