Shellharbour MP Anna Watson has urged state MPs to "take real action on domestic violence" by supporting legislation to criminalise coercive control in NSW.
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In a notice of motion in state parliament on Thursday, Ms Watson referred to findings by the NSW Domestic Violence Review Team which showed that in 99 per cent of cases, the relationship between a victim of domestic violence and their abuser was characterised by the use of coercive behaviours.
This could take the form of controlling their victim's finances, isolating them from family and friends, continually humiliating them, making threats against children or threatening them with injury or death.
"Coercive control is used to described an act or acts that are set to intimidate, humiliate, punish, belittle, frighten and control their victim. And is often a precursor to the physical violence which almost always follows," Ms Watson said.
"This type of abuse goes unpunished under current NSW law."
Ms Watson said while NSW laws had attempted to address the subject of domestic violence, the state needed to do more to "examine, educate and legislate to prosecute coercive controlling behaviours".
She said legislation seeking to criminalise coercive control in other jurisdictions was proving successful - singling out Scotland's Domestic Abuse Act as the gold standard.
"England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland and Tasmania, have criminalised coercive controlling behaviour," she said.
"In Scotland 190 cases have been reported to the Crown Office, it being the office responsible for the prosecution of crime, with 13 convictions, and one in Ireland."
Ms Watson said every eight-and-a-half minutes, NSW Police reported dealing with some form of domestic abuse related incident.
Meantime, she said, eight out of 10 domestic violence cases in NSW involved a male perpetrator, and female victim.
"Police officers from the Lake Illawarra Local Area Command estimate they spend half their time on domestic related violence incidents every single day," she added.
Ms Watson said: "We need to get this right for all these women ... who have been killed at the hands of a monster that they had an intimate relationship with."
Attorney General Mark Speakman proposed a few amendments to Ms Watson's notice of motion; to be debated further when parliament resumes on July 28.
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