LocalKind to meet with the Minister for the Prevention of Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault

Thank you all for signing our petition! We are pleased to announce that on the 10th of June my team and I will be meeting with The Hon. Jodie Harrison MP (Minister for the prevention of Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault and Minister for Women) to discuss our proposed legislation reforms. I have provided a copy of the letter sent to Jodie below:

Subject: Urgent Need for Information Sharing Reform to Strengthen Family Violence Response in NSW

Dear Jodie,

I am writing to urge the New South Wales Government to consider legislating an information sharing framework similar to Victoria’s Family Violence Information Sharing Scheme (FVISS) and Child Information Sharing Scheme (CISS). More information on this scheme can be found here: https://www.vic.gov.au/family-violence-information-sharing-scheme

Victoria's Royal Commission found that prior to this scheme important information wasn't being shared effectively between organisations and that failure to share this crucial information with frontline workers can have catastrophic consequences for victim survivors. I have found this to be true in my previous professional roles in Victoria when working with victim survivors of domestic and family violence.

In our current work and advocacy at Localkind, we are encountering these barriers on a daily basis. The inability to access and share critical information significantly limits our capacity to ensure safety for our clients and we regularly manage women who have significant risk to life due to domestic violence . Many of the women we support are fleeing violence from recidivist perpetrators of domestic violence, this scheme would allow for us to understand the pattern of behaviour and additional risk factors. Practitioners are often placed in the position of making decisions without full visibility of risk, which can have serious consequences for the safety of these women and their families.

Without access to critical information held across different services (police, child protection, health, and family violence providers), frontline workers are frequently required to make safety plans based on incomplete or fragmented information. This creates significant risks and results in warning signs or patterns of violence being missed.

In Victoria, the integration of FVISS, CISS, and MARAM supports this by enabling victim survivors to tell their story once, with information shared appropriately across prescribed services. This reduces the need for repeated disclosures of traumatic experiences and allows practitioners to focus on support, safety planning, and recovery. Importantly, the Victorian framework also recognises children as victim survivors in their own right, rather than solely as secondary witnesses. This ensures that their experiences, risks, and needs are properly identified and responded to through coordinated, multi-agency intervention.

The FVISS and CISS have delivered clear benefits within Victoria. In my professional experience it has enabled timely information sharing between agencies, increased ability to safety plan and consistency of agency responses and increased visibility of perpetrators as criminal history and patterns of unlawful behaviour are transparent and readily available.

The absence of a comparable scheme in New South Wales remains a significant barrier to best practice service delivery. Practitioners are often constrained by privacy uncertainties, which can prevent the sharing of information that may be critical to preventing harm.

Implementing a legislated information sharing framework in NSW would bring the state in line with updated, evidence-based approaches to family violence. Most importantly, it would enhance the capacity of services to keep victim survivors safe and ensure their experiences are recognised and responded to appropriately.

I am pleading with the NSW Government to prioritise the development of such a scheme. I have created a petition to bring awareness to the major gap in safety and service delivery we have in NSW: https://www.change.org/localkindDV

Thank you for your time and consideration of this important issue. My team and I would love the opportunity to discuss this issue with you further.

Kind regards,

Natasha Turner

Manager of Integrated Community Services

(Youth & Family Counselling, Community Drop-in, Homelessness Support

and Domestic Violence Services)