9. Question No. 9—Prevention of Family and Sexual ViolenceHon GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour) to the Minister for the Prevention of Family and Sexual ViolenceQuestion No. 9—Prevention of Family and Sexual Violence9. Hon GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour) to the Minister for the Prevention of Family and Sexual Violence: Does she agree with the omission of a reduction in family violence from the Prime Minister's Public Service targets?Hon KAREN CHHOUR (Minister for the Prevention of Family and Sexual Violence): No because family violence is not omitted from the Government's nine targets—it is part of the Reducing violent crime" target. I am proud to be part of a coalition Government which is committed to restoring law and order and putting victims first. This is why we have a series of targets that will focus the public sector on achieving improved results in this area including reducing crime with a target of 20000 fewer people as victims of assaults robberies and sexual assaults by 2029. This Government is committed to and has already announced a range of measures that help the victims of family violence including bringing back three-strikes legislation with the addition to the new strangulation and suffocation offence and backing police to crack down on gangs.Hon Ginny Andersen: How does she think victims of family and sexual violence will respond to the knowledge that this Government will only develop targets that are "responsive" to Government intervention?Hon KAREN CHHOUR: Just because family violence is not a stand-alone target among the nine Government targets does not mean it is not a priority. This Government considered a range of targets and measures and settled on nine measures that it believes will best focus the public sector on achieving better results.Hon Ginny Andersen: Does she agree with the advice of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet that developing a specific target for family violence was not suitable as "family violence victimisations are unlikely to change over a three- to six-month period and therefore it is not specific enough to drive delivery."; if not why not?Hon KAREN CHHOUR: I received a range of advice on this topic and I also received advice from officials that a stand-alone family violence target was not suitable for a number of reasons including that an increase in reporting can be seen as an improvement as more people seek help and currently under successive Governments the key measures regarding family violence are not well suited to the setting of or reporting against quarterly targets.Hon Ginny Andersen: Can the Minister just restate that please: that she did not record a family violence target because it would go up as more family violence interventions were reported?SPEAKER: No I don't think that's—ask a question.Hon Ginny Andersen: I'll reframe it; sorry. Is it the Minister's view that she did not think it—[Interruption]SPEAKER: Sorry. There was a question being asked so please ask it again. The House will be quiet.Hon Ginny Andersen: Is it the Minister's view that it was not necessary to develop a specific target for family and sexual violence because it would show an increase in reporting of instances of family and sexual violence?Hon KAREN CHHOUR: No that's not what I said. What I said was the advice was we could seem like we have achieved something when we actually haven't. The advice may see that an increase in reporting could be seen as an improvement when actually it just means more people are reporting—doesn't mean that we've made successes in that space.Hon Ginny Andersen: Does she think it's acceptable to only develop targets that are easy to measure and easy to achieve and if so where does this leave victims of family and sexual violence?Hon KAREN CHHOUR: As I've travelled around the country the last couple of months talking to NGOs and community organisations on where they see the gaps and where they see the Government can help them in this space I realise there is a lot of work to do and we have to make sure that we're actually listening to the people on the ground and making a real positive difference in this space rather than reactionary legislation and targets that don't make a damn bit of difference."