Tougher Penalties for Domestic Violence Offenders Under Proposed Laws
The Queensland government has proposed new laws to increase penalties for domestic and family violence offenders who breach protection orders. The legislation aims to ease the workload of police and better protect victims.
Domestic and family violence offenders who breach protection orders will face harsher penalties under new proposed laws from the Queensland government. The legislation, expected to be introduced on Thursday, will create new offences for the repeated contravention of a Police Protection Direction (PPD) or a Domestic Violence Order (DVO).
Tougher Penalties and Extended Monitoring
The proposed laws will increase the duration of a PPD from 12 months to three years and the maximum penalty for breaching an order from three to five years. An electronic ankle monitoring pilot for high-risk domestic and family violence offenders will be expanded statewide, and a requirement will be introduced for courts to consider fitting a device as part of a DVO.
Police Minister Dan Purdie said the changes were about trying to ease the workload of police:
"We're going to make sure that we expand it, and we give police the powers that they need to rapidly protect victims and get to that next victim sooner."
Criticism and Calls for Change
Queensland Police Union president Shane Prior was supportive of the changes to PPDs and urged the government to go further. He said he would be advocating for the government to change the definition of a domestic and family violence victim to only include intimate partner relationships when concerning police orders.
"That's the priority because right now, we've got a situation in the state where informal care disputes and family arguments are being pulled into this one remit, and it just ensures it enters the queue like everything else," he said.
"And we've got victims of intimate partner violence in the state waiting in the queue for a police response."
When asked about changes to the definition, Mr Purdie said:
"It is certainly something that we certainly won't be turning away from in the future,"
However, Premier David Crisafulli later ruled out any changes to the definition, responding to a question in parliament:
"The answer is yes,"
when asked if the premier would rule out narrowing the meaning of relevant relationships as defined in the Domestic and Family Violence Prevention Act.