Victoria Law Reform Commission Consultation on Stalking

The Victoria Law Reform Commission (VLRC) is conducting a public consultation on stalking.

It has issued a consultation paper and will be gathering input until August:

"Stalking is a set of behaviours that can cause great harm to victims’ mental and physical health. If not addressed, it can also escalate to include other types of serious offending, more serious offending, including serious violence and—tragically—homicide and suicide."

"Due to technological advancements, types of stalking behaviour have evolved and can be carried out remotely, without physical proximity to the victim."

"The VLRC is asked to review and report on Victoria’s legal responses to stalking, harassment and similar conduct, including the statutory framework for and operation of the Personal Safety Intervention Order (PSIO) system, drawing upon best practice from the family violence system, criminological research and victim support services. The review should identify barriers to current law effectively responding to stalking, harassment and similar conduct, and make recommendations to address these barriers and improve the justice system’s response, with victim safety and wellbeing the paramount consideration."

"Stalking behaviours can occur in both a family violence and non-family violence context. However, while a specialist, cohesive approach to these behaviours has been developed in a family violence context, less attention has been devoted to the non-family violence response. Additional measures may be required to maximise victim safety and wellbeing and perpetrator accountability, and to allow for more effective early interventions in cases of high or escalating risk. The review may consider mechanisms from the family violence context, such as family violence safety notices and the prohibition on cross-examination by the respondent/accused person. New measures responding to stalking in both family violence and non-family violence contexts should also be considered, such as electronic monitoring as a condition of an intervention order, and responses that address technology-facilitated abuse."

"While stalking is committed by people of all genders, the VLRC is requested to note that most perpetrators of stalking are men, and most victims of stalking are women."

It intends to produce an interim report by 31 December 2021, and a final report by 30 June 2022.

The state of Victoria is in south-eastern Australia and its capital is Melbourne.