What is Happening at Shine

Featuring issue expert Shine GM Jane Drumm, this in-depth segment looks at the NZ criminal justice response to NZ and why women often stand by men who are violent, looking in particular at the story of John Tanner. It also highlights efforts to combat domestic violence in Victoria, Australia where the government is rolling out a massive, multi-faceted campaign with a $2 billion price tag. According to Jane, "They've realised that in order to get on top of this issue, they are going to have to do a major coherent strategy which will cost a huge amount of $$."

Watch first segment of the programme on TVNZ OnDemand

In the August FYI Magazine for Auckland’s North Shore business community, this article talks about Shine and our DVFREE workplace programme. According to Shine's Cynthia Kawana, "Organisations with effective policy and supports in place can make a huge difference in the lives of their staff at a time of real crisis."

Read the article at http://businessnh.org.nz/webform/keep-up-to-date/#fyimag
Find out more about DVFREE at www.dvfree.org.nz

John and Sarah's story is an example of what can be achieved if staff members step in when they believe a colleague is being abused. This workplace support is now law, after the Domestic Violence - Victims' Protection Bill passed its third reading on July 25. According to Sarah: "The psyche of the abuser is they need 100 per cent control." She feared this could now extend to the workplace, because the abuser wouldn't want to let their partner go to a place where they could readily access help. Shine's Holly Carrington also agreed with Sarah's fears. But on balance she said she believed employers having policies and systems in place to support staff experiencing domestic violence would help far more people than it would hurt.
Read article in Stuff

From now through Jan 2019, when you visit The Warehouse in these Auckland suburbs, pick up a token at checkout and VOTE FOR SHINE to support our women's refuges in Auckland:

Albany
Birkenhead
Glenfield
Milford
New Lynn
St Lukes


THANK YOU to these Warehouse stores for including Shine in your Customer Choice Programme.

Take on the ASB Auckland Marathon on 28th October 2018 with Team Shine and change a life.  Entry fees go up end of  August!

Marathon 42.2km
Half Marathon 21.1km
Traverse 12km 

Sign up to Team Shine here and help the team raise $20,000 to help victims of domestic violence get safe and stay safe.

Join the team by setting up your own fundraising page here and ask your friends and family to sponsor your Auckland Marathon.  

We challenge you personally to raise over $1,000 to change lives in your community.  In return, we will give you: 

• support with links to training plans
• fundraising support
• a chance to meet and train with other Team Shine members
• invites to a pre Marathon events 
• plus, we’ll look after you at the finish line!

Just in case you need more motivation...

• For every $250 raised, you will change lives  and help one family get safe and stay safe, by covering the cost of an advocate's urgent callout to a victim at home or in hospital following an arrest, and then the first KIDshine advocate home visit with the victim's children. So we encourage you to aim high!
• When you have raised $500 we will give you a free ‘I Don’t Sweat, I Shine*’ running t-shirt
• When you have raised $1,000 we will refund your entry fee to the Auckland Marathon

Remember to register for the Auckland Marathon here and answer NO to the “Do you wish to fundraise for a charity at the ASB Auckland Marathon?”

For more information about the Auckland Marathon and Team Shine, contact Carol Herbert on 021 192 3548. 

Shine is proud to be a charity partner of the Vodafone Warriors. This year, the Warriors supported their four charity partners at The Great Vodafone Warriors Charity Game Day on July 22nd. The event was a massive success, raising a total of $71,409 for the four charities through a range of activities - which meant $17,852 raised for Shine.

Thank you to Adrian at Fifth Avenue Diamond Experts for donating an exquisite man’s watch as an auction prize, the awesome Suncorp staff for volunteering on the day, the Warriors team and of course their wonderful fans. 

Ruben Wiki, Warriors assistant strength and conditioning coach, helped to promote the event in an interview with the NZ Herald. 

'Wiki is fiercely passionate about the charity Shine. The 45-year-old's staunch anti-domestic violence stance stems back from his younger days. His mother was a victim to family violence as he was growing up and the pain he saw her endure made him want to move to stop such things happening to other families. "I wanted to speak out against violence against women."

Read NZ Herald article with Warriors legend Ruben Wiki speaking about domestic violence and Shine

The Domestic Violence Victims Protection Act passed today and will come into effect in April 2019. ‘Domestic violence charity Shine said the bill would benefit all employers, including small businesses, through increased productivity and better employee retention. Shine communications manager Holly Carrington said domestic violence was already costing businesses – "not just financially but more importantly the human toll. Without support from their employer, work is not a safe place for victims of domestic violence, and these staff get judged and blamed for resulting performance issues and often end up leaving their job," she said. 

The law requires employers to give victims of domestic violence up to 10 days leave from work, separate from annual leave and sick leave entitlements, making New Zealand the first country in the world to offer this type of leave as a universal entitlement. It also allows workers who are victims of domestic violence to request flexible working arrangements and prohibits being a victim of domestic violence as a grounds for discrimination under the Human Rights Act.

Read Stuff article

Read NZ Herald article

See Newshub story

Listen to Newstalk ZB story

Read UK Guardian story

Read National Public Radio (USA) story

Read Time story

Venus Envy podcast interview with recently retired Shine Senior Advocate Mary McGee about domestic violence in New Zealand, following an interview with Jacinda Ardern on leadership and feminism. Hosted by Noelle McCarthy, and brought to you by The Spinoff in association with Auckland Museum.

Listen to the full interview by scrolling down to 'Venus Envy' then 'Week One'. The interview with Mary McGee starts at 18'55'', and here are her salient points:
"Every Monday, (at Shine) we’d go through the arrest list..of victims, many situations – women have injuries, in hospital with broken bones, teeth knocked out, nasty facial injuries, black eyes. I have seen it all, from the most horrific maimings right down to much ‘lesser’ incidents, but in fact sometimes there’s no correlation between the degree of injury and the effect. I recall a woman after a long period of physical abuse, one day he spat in her face, and that was the final humiliation that caused her to get away from him.

 I can recall so many nasty injuries – sometimes so bad you don’t want to repeat, you don’t want others to have to carry that around in their head. One woman had her bottom lip bitten right off. She’d known this guy only three months. He did not want her away from his side or speaking to anyone else. She spoke to her brother in the car and he did that. It is very serious stuff and it is pandemic. There’s so much of it out there.

I think it’s getting worse, the degree of violence is getting worse… But I still believe it’s a problem with a solution. We can eliminate violence from our society.

I have also worked at the Family Court as a Family Court Coordinator… Seeing injustices perpetrated by the system on women and children just made me really want to work in this field and try and do whatever I could to assist those people…. I couldn’t stay there (at the court) and watch some of the decisions being made… The men’s lobby in the early 90’s persuaded a lot of judges in that direction, but the pendulum still hasn’t swung back to the middle. There are a lot of decisions that are really misogynistic in the Family Court.

It’s a gender issue. That means that the overwhelming percentage of offenders are male. They have a sense of entitlement. The degree of violence, it’s just horrible. It comes from thousands of years of socialization and training. And it’s everywhere. If you work in it you can’t help but be affected…

Men are more likely to be believed than women. That’s why the Backbone Collective has been set up… Men are able to pursue their victims in the Family Court because they often have access to more resources, often don’t have children to look after fulltime, women don’t have same kinds of careers. These men claim to care about their children. I spoke to a woman the other day who was pursued for ten years by her partner through the court. This woman was agreeing with every single thing he suggested, he was wanting everything from the marital property. His applications to the court were not thrown out, they’re heard, given credence.

These men who are offenders are in pain and hurting, probably they were victims themselves as children. They’re angry. They have to get help. It’s not enough to take this out on their women and children, then be forced to leave. There’s so much help out there. There’s counselling and programmes.

 A lot of women give their offending partner chance after chance after chance to redeem themselves. But often they don’t, won’t, can’t.

I would love to see more decent men helping the women sort this out. Such as male employers giving victims time off work to sort stuff out. Men training to deliver programmes, big buddy guys for young men, all kinds of political work – like lobbying government for money for agencies like Shine, lobbying advertising agencies to think hard about what they’re putting out there, assisting people like Denise Ritchie at ECPAT. Thousands of women volunteers are working with this stuff but not men so much. 

Domestic violence - people in New Zealand don’t know how prevalent it is. It really is a big problem. It’s the blue bit in the flame at the centre, all the other problems come from this.
We have clients from very wealthy situations, it’s in all socioeconomic areas, but it is more prevalent in lower socioeconomic areas. This could be because women with money can get out of relationships more easily. They can go stay in a motel, they can work out their own plan of escape without calling the police.

Often it’s a lack of resources. If I’m a woman with three children and my partner isn’t working, I’m living on a benefit, only just got enough money to feed the children, how am I going to make a substantive plan to get myself and my children - in one piece - out of a dangerous situation…

It’s very difficult to leave. Even women without violence in their relationship find it difficult to leave a partner. Just think about how much more difficult it is to leave if you’re scared, if he’s threatened to kill you if you leave, if he’s threatened to hurt the children if you leave him.

Often these kids (in homes where there is domestic violence) are living with cortisol rushing through their bodies all the time. They’re living in a state of fight, flight or freeze. They’re scared, they can’t concentrate at school, they can’t eat properly, they’re not clothed properly, there’s no money. Often these guys are taking the money and spending it. The children – it’s a very difficult and sad thing, shocking.

Most New Zealanders have no idea this is going on. Most Monday mornings in Auckland, in court there’ll be 10-20 men having been arrested for assaults on their families. This is just in Auckland central policing district.

If everybody decided to really work together – judiciary, legislators, police, agencies, etc. I’m sure we would see a major difference. They say they are working together. There’s not really a real commitment, a powerful interest in changing this.

This happens because of the way men are thinking about women and about themselves and their role. I think we can change the way we think. It’s not an imperative that men beat up their partner. They can change the way they think if they want to."

Shine says that the Domestic Violence - Victims' Protection Bill will benefit all employers, including small businesses, through increased productivity and better employee retention. ‘Domestic violence is already costing our businesses - not just financially but more importantly the human toll. Without support from their employer, work is not a safe place for victims of domestic violence, and these staff get judged and blamed for resulting performance issues and often end up leaving their job.,’ says Holly. ‘Businesses without a domestic violence programme are not playing their part to stop domestic violence, and there’s also a cost in lost productivity and additional staff recruitment.’

Read article in Voxy

The Working Group is chaired by Dame Silvia Cartwright and members include Shine GM Jane Drumm. The Group was established mid-April following widespread allegations of sexual harassment, bullying and discrimination within the legal profession, combined with a culture of silence and under-reporting of such misconduct.. The Group is inviting people to share their thoughts and ideas as to what changes and improvements can be made by emailing workinggroup@lawsociety.org.nz

Read article from Law Society website