DFV prevention strategy

The Queensland Government is taking action to end domestic and family violence (DFV). However, we cannot do it alone.

About the strategy

The Domestic and family violence prevention strategy 2016–2026 (PDF) (or DOCX) (the strategy) is a vehicle to drive change across all sectors of the Queensland community.

The strategy was informed by a 3-month community collaboration program, including contributions from more than 1,280 individuals. Read what Queenslanders told us in the Community collaboration program consultation report.

The strategy sets the direction for collaborative action to end DFV in Queensland, encouraging partnerships between the government, community and business.

It outlines a shared vision and a set of principles to guide action across government and the community, including a staged 10-year plan on how we will get there.

Our reforms—outlined in the strategy—recognise the victim-survivor’s perspective, prioritise their safety, and reduce the onus on them to take action. We will focus on educating frontline professionals to help them recognise and respond to DFV, creating safe communities and workplaces that support victims, providing effective services that efficiently wrap around the victim, and ensuring our legal system supports victims and holds perpetrators to account.

The strategy also continues to build on the effective work already being done by the specialist DFV support sector to address DFV.

How we will deliver action

The Fourth action plan 2022–23 to 2025–26 builds on the significant work of Queensland’s DFV reform program delivered under the:

Released on 25 November 2022, the Fourth action plan provides a comprehensive blueprint capturing the Queensland Government's DFV reform over the final 4 years of the strategy. This incorporates government commitments in response to the Women’s and Safety Justice Taskforce (the Taskforce) first report Hear her voice – Report One – Addressing coercive control and domestic and family violence in Queensland (Report One). A key recommendation from Report One was an Independent Commission of Inquiry into Queensland Police Service responses to  DFV. The initial government response includes investment of $100 million in a raft of initiatives to provide enhanced support for those impacted by DFV, consistent with the Fourth action plan.

There are also a number of initiatives under the Fourth action plan that align with recommendations made by the Taskforce's second report, Hear her voice – Report Two – Women and girls' experiences across the criminal justice system (Report Two), noting the intersection of sexual violence and DFV. The Fourth action plan also captures priorities identified from an independent evaluation of the Third action plan and a range of other DFV-related reports.

Under the Fourth action plan we will deliver enhanced action through signature initiatives such as:

  • legislating against coercive control
  • developing a whole-of-government strategy for culturally-safe services for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who interact with the criminal justice system
  • developing a system-wide strategy to respond to all perpetrators of DFV, which will compliment a statewide network of perpetrator programs
  • continued expansion and roll-out of DFV specialist courts
  • evolving and expanding the Specialist Domestic and Family Violence Court model
  • ensuring DFV responses are informed by—and specific to the needs of—groups of people who are more likely to be impacted by DFV and can face greater challenged in accessing appropriate support.

How you can make a difference

We need to work together to stop the behaviour and attitudes that allow DFV to continue. All over the state⁠—in our workplaces, schools, sporting clubs, neighbourhoods and communities⁠—find out how you can help put an end to DFV.

You can also find out more about the work of the Domestic and Family Violence Prevention Council.

How we will measure success

The strategy is supported by the Domestic, family and sexual violence system monitoring and evaluation framework (the monitoring and evaluation framework), which replaces the old Evaluation framework and Revised indicator matrix.

The new monitoring and evaluation framework continues to provide the reform agenda with a strong base to track progress and outcomes against key objectives and document learnings to help inform future directions.

Evaluation is critical to ensuring that the reforms outlined in the strategy are achieving their stated goals. The monitoring and evaluation framework sets out how the Queensland Government will assess the impact and outcomes of the strategy and all domestic, family and sexual violence reforms underway.

Previous reviews of the 4 action plans have informed the development of the monitoring and evaluation framework.

In 2022, Deloitte Access Economics completed an independent Review of the Third action plan (PDF) (or DOCX), exploring the extent to which Queensland is on-track towards achieving the strategy’s long-term vision.

Last updated:
21 December 2023