Many Gippsland women who experienced family violence were not aware that they were also experiencing some financial abuse in the relationship – an issue that can go unseen when the victim is economically dependent on the perpetrator.
Quantum Support Services general manager Cyndi Pullar said financial abuse could be the “hardest to break” among forms of family violence for various reasons, such as the victim’s acceptance of the behaviour.
“They don’t see the link between financial abuse and emotional abuse and the impact on them, how they might feel scared at the counter while doing their groceries, that they may not have enough money or comfortable when a family member wants to have lunch [because their expenses are being tracked],” Ms Pullar said.
Ms Pullar said many women did not consider financial abuse on its own as a form of family violence as it could be “difficult to accept that the person you love is the perpetrator of family violence against you”.
She said many women adopted the view “he’s the bread winner, I should be grateful he’s giving me the funds”.
“So therefore they don’t actually identify that their situation is family violence,” she said.
“Financial abuse is very common in the family violence that we work with and we believe it’s common because it’s power control and coercion.”
Ms Pullar said women who had been out of work and were financially dependent on the perpetrator were specifically in a disadvantageous position especially if they had never held a bank account under their own name. “Particularly for women who don’t work when they leave it’s difficult to have a bank loan because nothing’s ever been in their name,” she said.
Ms Pullar said other forms of financial abuse could also happen like when a woman was prevented from carrying cash and ordered to use debit or credit cards.
Perpetrators could also use mobile banking to track women’s expenses and movements, she said.
“Particularly when they don’t have access to cash it does take that freedom away on your ability to think for yourself because you’re constantly having to be accountable,” Ms Pullar said.
She said family violence happened in many forms but it normally started in a disrespectful relationship that was gender-based “in regard to the perpetrator’s view of the female”.
“That is a foundation that is there and that it exist and there’s just other forms that build on top that contribute to the picture of complexity of family violence for each family,” Ms Pullar said.
