Public hearings for South Australia's royal commission into domestic, family and sexual violence have now ended with commissioner Natasha Stott Despoja due to present her findings to the state government in four months' time. The three-million-dollar inquiry has heard about multiple system failures as well as opportunities for change.
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00:00I don't think they can prevent it. That's what an 11-year-old child wrote on a postcard
00:08addressed to the Domestic Violence Royal Commission. The words sum up the despair many South Australians
00:13felt at the end of 2023. Six deaths within weeks, each linked to alleged family and domestic
00:20violence. More than a year later, and the Royal Commission that was called in the wake
00:24of the deaths, has heard from hundreds of South Australians, all with a story or insight
00:30into domestic, family and sexual violence. Much of what Royal Commissioner Natasha Stott
00:35Despoja was told is yet to be made public. But what was said at the public hearings paints
00:41a disturbing picture. The forms of violence discussed were varied. Coercive control, female
00:46genital mutilation, forced marriage, financial abuse and withholding medications, to name
00:52a few. The Commission heard SA Police responds to 100 domestic incidents and issues nine
00:58intervention orders on average each day. It also heard that women were being let down
01:03by systems gaps in regional areas and through the Child Protection and Family Court systems.
01:09But Miss Stott Despoja says she believes it is possible to prevent domestic violence.
01:14It's an issue that I am confronted with every day now. I'm conscious of every day, whether
01:22it's in South Australia, Australia, or globally. And it is haunting.
01:29Miss Stott Despoja is expected to hand down a report with recommendations to the State
01:33Government in July.