TRANSCRIPT
Uyen Truong arrived in Australia from Vietnam in 2012 looking to start a new life with her husband and children.
But she says living with her now ex-partner and in-laws became difficult.
"Four years total we lived together. I had too much stress, sad, violent but at that time I didn’t know that it's called violence. And then I just tried really hard to be a good wife, good daughter-in-law. I tried my best to do everything but I didn't get any happiness and freedom for myself and my kids so that's why I'm thinking (I needed) to get out of there."
She spoke no English and had no family or money of her own as her husband took control of every aspect of her life.
"It's terrible, and then I keep thinking about it. But I (was) scared. I was so scared I don’t know how I can get out and I don't know about the future, and some people they can help me. So nervous. But I was just always thinking about that need to get out."
Her uncertainty about where to seek help isn't unique among migrant and culturally diverse women.
Settlement agency AMES Australia has surveyed 30 community leaders in Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide, about the barriers faced by women just like Uyen Truong.
50 percent of the respondents said their communities had inadequate access to services and support.
53 percent were not sure about where to get help, and 55 percent said there were no adequate places to access refuge.
Mirta Gonzalez is the general manager of education and participation at AMES.
She says one of the main issues is while survivors have specialist services available, the information is not getting through to the relevant communities.
"And also, when women did access the services, the services are not as responsive to their specific needs. So they were finding various barriers - either cultural or language - that they were experiencing."
The results are not surprising for Rasha Abbas - the CEO of specialist family violence provider, inTouch.
"We had a woman who lived in her car for a month because she didn’t actually know that there were services there to support her. So without services like ours those women are left stranded. And the vulnerable in our community are then left without the support that they can, and should be, accessing."
The federal government says it's spending a significant amount of funding on programs to assist migrant women and children; and those from culturally and linguistically diverse communities.
One of those measures includes: increasing access to emergency accommodation through its $100 million Safe Places Inclusion Round.
The funding aims to deliver up to 720 additional accommodation spots.
Ms Abbas says funding is always welcome, but the approach to the issue also needs to change.
"Shift from the focus on response and crisis to more work on prevention; and more work on healing and recovery. When we leave the women empowered, strong, with employment pathways, financial wellbeing, therapeutic work that is done with them and their kids. Then they feel stronger and they don't have to go back into bad relationships. Or they go back into relationships knowing what's right and they can be respectful, positive relationships."
Uyen Truong describes her life as beautiful now, but says she doesn't want to see other women face the same barriers she experienced.
"I'm very content now, very happy. Because that time from zero, now I have 10. Zero to 10. That's very hard and long way to do everything, settlement right now. Yeah I think it's hard but...Every women they can do it, because of their children. Fight for it." (Laughs)
