MELBOURNE COULD INTRODUCE ‘safe havens’ in the city centre that are aimed at keeping women safe.
The city’s lord mayor, Robert Doyle, told Morning Ireland on RTÉ Radio 1 today that the murder of Irish woman Jill Meagher in Melbourne didn’t precipitate the move, but that her untimely death “touched us all very deeply”.
He said there is not a doubt that the issue of violence, including family violence and domestic violence, “is very high in our conscious at the moment so as a city we are looking at creating a safe space where women know they can go late at night which they know is welcoming and which is safe for them”.
While the official details have not been released, Doyle said that they could include a community health system, or a place in the city that is well lit and where police are present, and that there would be CCTV there.
The initiative is part of a wider plan at tackling violence against women in public, reports the Guardian.
Doyle said it is an attempt to say to people, “if you are in the city and it is late at night there are places where it is safe to be picked up”.
“I challenge every city in the world to make a guarantee that any women is safe in the city at any time,” he said, adding he believes it is “not possible”.
He said that Melbourne is a “very safe city” but such safe havens were needed.
After Jill’s death, the Victorian government ordered an audit of the CCTV network in Melbourne, ABC News reported at the time. The aim was to identify any blackspots in the city or suburbs.
The Foundation to Prevent Violence Against Women and Children was launched in Australia late in July, by the Commonwealth Minister for the Status of Women, the Hon Julie Collins MP, and the Victorian Minister for Community Services, the Hon Mary Wooldridge MP.
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