Provide funding and other resources to support LGBTI services and communities

Government has developed resources for educating and informing people from LGBTIQ+ communities about family violence and how to get help.

The community education materials developed align with other Victorian and national family violence initiatives.

An LGBTIQ+ family violence training module was developed and rolled out to mainstream family violence service providers in 2019–20.

Government has invested in the Statewide LGBTIQ+ Family Violence Inclusion Advisor position which focuses on building the capacity of specialist family violence services to support and respond to people from LGBTIQ+ communities.

Two safe accommodation projects have been funded and implemented to capture good practice, build capacity within the homelessness and family violence accommodation sectors, and develop and pilot sector-specific training materials and resources.

Government has also invested in the Rainbow Door service operated by Switchboard Victoria which provides family violence and mental health support to LGBTIQ+ communities and connects individuals and families to a range of support services.

The W/Respect LGBTIQ+ specialist service website was launched in September 2018 and contains community information to raise awareness about family violence and available services and supports, as well as resources for practitioners to support inclusive service responses. The website continues to be expanded and regularly updated, most recently with information relating to impacts of COVID-19 on family violence for LGBTIQ+ people.

A community education campaign was launched during the 2020 Midsumma Festival, including promotional material directing people to the W/Respect website.

Rainbow Health Victoria was funded to develop an LGBTIQ+ family violence training module for family violence service providers to support LGBTIQ+ inclusive policy and practice, with implementation occurring over 2019-20. Funding was provided to deliver the module to staff in the first tranche of 20 specialist family violence services supported to undergo Rainbow Tick accreditation. The module is available on a fee-for-service basis to other services.

A project to build capacity in housing and homelessness services in the northern and western metropolitan areas to provide inclusive services was funded by the Department of Families, Fairness and Housing Western Melbourne Area and Family Safety Victoria (FSV) in 2018-19. This project included the development of a training package and resources for workers. Family Safety Victoria provided an additional year of funding to support the extension of the learnings and resources to a statewide level.

The LGBTIQ+ Inclusive Refuge Demonstration Project was funded in 2019-20 to build the capacity of two dispersed refuge services to provide safe and inclusive accommodation, including a toolkit to support the sharing of learnings and the development of better practice in this area of service provision.

Implemented.