By ANEEKA SIMONIS
FORMER domestic violence training practices within the police force were “atrocious”, according to a senior Pakenham officer who said he only spent one training session on the problem when he first joined.
Senior Sergeant Graeme Stanley said that when he began with Victoria Police in the early ’90s, his family violence training was limited to a 30-minute, one-off session with a senior police officer.
“Training was atrocious for domestic violence when I was a young constable,” he said to an audience on White Ribbon Day.
He said family violence reports were “not given a high priority” then which allowed the incidents to continue unchallenged.
But he said that has all changed – with police shifting a large focus onto protecting victims of domestic violence under their pro-arrest, pro-charge policy.
“Training has improved enormously since them. Immediately as a young recruit walks into the academy, it is brought to their attention,” Sen Sgt Stanley he told the meeting in Pakenham Hall on 25 November.
He said that almost every second report which comes over his police radio is domestic violence related and that the increase in reports was the result of changing attitudes which encouraged victims to report incidents.
“Reports did come in back then, but not to the extent that they do now,” he said.
“It wasn’t given a high priority.
“The impact of what family violence has on the community wasn’t known until much later on so there has been a lot of training to skill up members to the current level.”
Officers in the region need the best tools for the job, with the Southern Metro Division 3 area including Cardinia Shire, Casey and Greater Dandenong recording the highest number of reported domestic violence incidents state-wide.
Police recorded more than 7200 family violence incidents in 2014-15, with Cardinia Shire’s rate of offending jumping by 12 per cent from the previous 12 months.
“And we assume it will continue to grow. A lot of incidents are presumed to be going unreported,” he said.
He said the Cardinia Family Violence Unit, which operates out of Pakenham police station, has a specialised family service worker from Connections UnitingCare to support victims.
