How the government’s new immigration policy will cause more trauma for victim-survivors of domestic violence

After a six-week delay, Immigration Minister Tony Burke has announced changes to the migration system. Amid all the analysis and discussion it triggered, there was nothing to indicate an understanding that these changes need to have a safety net for victim-survivors of domestic and family violence.

There has been significant work documenting the connection between temporary migration and domestic and family violence. This includes the ways the migration system can be weaponised by perpetrators and can punish victim-survivors (including by excluding them from access to support).

The largest national study of migrant and refugee women found that one in three experienced domestic and family violence. It also found temporary migrants were more likely to experience violence, and specifically violence connected to their visa status.

The connection between temporary migration and domestic and family violence

Migration policy as it is now provides a safety net for women on partner visas with a pathway to permanency – the family violence provisions.

However, many women are in relationships with abusive partners and in many cases have children with perpetrators who do not hold a partner visa. This includes:

• women who might come to Australia (for example, as student visa holders) and form a relationship with someone who becomes abusive
• women who seek asylum in Australia and do not report violence because of concerns this will result in the family breadwinner being denied a protection visa
• women who are promised partner visas by perpetrators, but come to Australia on visitor visas, and this promise of a permanent visa is used to control them.

In some cases, perpetrators lie about visa status. Women are tricked into believing they hold partner visas, but actually enter the country on visitor visas.

Migrant women who experience violence in Australia are denied many forms of domestic and family violence-related support. They also have limited claims to remaining in Australia if they want to. Notably, to date, there is limited commitment to addressing these issues in the National Plan to End Violence Against Women and their children.

What will the impact be on victim-survivors?

In his National Press Club address, Burke announced a number of changes. I highlight just one to show the importance of why recognising the reality of domestic and family violence matters in any changes to migration system settings is urgent.

A key change Burke has announced is a crackdown on overstayers, with the threat of detention facilities to increase deterrence.

This matters because as detailed above, many women overstay their visas without knowing they are doing so.

In the national study of migrant and refugee women we asked all participants who were temporary visa holders and/or had indicated they had experienced migration-related controlling behaviours about their confidence in their visa rights in Australia.

Notably, only 22% were confident in their knowledge of the visa they held and their rights connected to that visa in Australia.

These changes also provide another way for perpetrators to weaponise this system and threaten women with “dobbing them in” to have them deported. This already happens at high rates, and the new policy hands more control to perpetrators.

A key part of documented controlling behaviours in these cases is perpetrators denying women access to information. This ensures they cannot access correspondence from the Department of Home Affairs. It also means the perpetrators hold all access and information about visa matters.

Across Australia, service providers who support women in these circumstances often come across victim-survivors who don’t know what visa they hold and whose visa has expired. They have no idea they are in the country unlawfully.

What should be done?

These changes run the risk that more women will remain silent and be forced to remain in violent and dangerous situations. The proposed changes could also result in women who are experiencing violence also being punished by the migration system settings.

How do we ensure we send the right signals to women experiencing violence that they should come forward and seek safety?

We need the Albanese government to recognise that victim-survivors of domestic and family violence will potentially be collateral damage in this new policy.

We need urgent measures to review how the migration system is impacting victims of domestic and family violence. And we need the government to have a clear visa solution for victims of domestic and family violence.

Next week, the national advocacy group for women on temporary visas experiencing domestic and family violence is launching the third Blueprint for Reform. This document outlines ways to address the current migration system settings to ensure all women who are experiencing domestic and family violence have access to safety in Australia.

This announcement signals the urgency of attending to reform that factors in what we already know about domestic and family violence and the migration system, and ensuring there are safety nets for all victim-survivors.