Collective Action for Respect and Equality Strategy Deep Dive
Meet the faces behind the Collective Action for Respect and Equality and learn more about the key elements of WHLM's work in primary prevention of violence against women.
Who is behind the Strategy and Women’s Health Loddon Mallee’s (WHLM) primary prevention of violence against women work?
Meet Tess and Hayley, the two health promotion professionals behind the Collective Action for Respect and Equality (CARE) Strategy and implementation.
Hayley is part of the Health Promotion team at WHLM, focusing on primary prevention of violence against women. She is responsible for coordinating the regional primary prevention partnership – CARE.
“CARE Stands for Collective action for Respect and Equality, because the only way to do this work is together. If we build an awareness and common understanding of how to stop violence before it starts in a wide variety of workplaces and community settings, we will see the changes start to happen.”
Tess is a young public health professional with “a passion for women’s health, well-being and rights, as well a deep love for the question ‘why?’” She also works in the Health Promotion team at WHLM, operating across both the Gender Equity and the Primary Prevention of Violence portfolios.
What is the Collective Action for Respect and Equality?
The Collective Action for Respect and Equality Partnership is a regional partnership formed to support collective action in the Loddon Mallee that works to ensure that all members of our community feel safe, respected and equal in their everyday lives.
CARE is a primary prevention partnership that brings together organisations who are committed to preventing gender-based violence, with a strong focus on working within workplaces and the broader community to shift the attitudes, practices and beliefs that drive gender inequality and, in turn, violence.
Through CARE, members come together, support each other, and gain more skills and information (and motivation!) to keep doing this work through training, events and peer learning opportunities.
What is the CARE Strategy?
The strategy provides partners with suggestions for strategic areas that they can work in, as well as practical actions that they can take to help achieve social change.
The CARE Strategy is useful to organisations for different reasons. Some may align their own strategies with the strategic directions outlined in CARE, others may use it as a resource for ideas of what they can be focusing on in their local grass roots primary prevention activities. The CARE Strategy is also a great resource with links to evidence and information about the types of violence, and other key primary prevention resources.
The Care Strategy is the guiding light of the partnership; the document that underpins the work that CARE Partners do and keeps us on track to achieve our vision – a world in which ‘women and their children live free from violence and discrimination in communities that actively support and champion gender equality.’
How did the CARE Strategy come about?
The CARE Strategy follows on from the CARE Framework, the original partnership guide that was established by Women’s Health Loddon Mallee in 2020, a framework that focused on connecting communities throughout the region, aligning momentum and strengthening partnerships for the primary prevention of violence.
“The Strategy sets clear goals that all organisations can embrace at any stage in their primary prevention involvement. Some may only focus on one or two of the goals and that is fine. It’s the small actions by many which create the bigger changes we need to prevent violence against women from happening in the first place.”
Who is the Strategy aimed at and how will it be applied across communities?
The Strategy has been developed with the aim of supporting sectors that work closely with community, such as Local Government, Health, Community Health, Education, Family services, Sports Clubs, and more.
CARE Partners will tackle gender inequality and prevent gendered violence in innovative ways, and this contributes to our overall collective knowledge. We learn from each other.
Who is invited to the launch of the new Strategy?
Anyone who is interested in supporting a safe, respectful, and equal environment for all people in the Loddon Mallee should come along…. so, ideally everyone.
If your organisation isn’t a CARE Partner yet, attending the strategy launch is a great opportunity to hear more about the collective primary prevention work in our region, and hear firsthand from the partners themselves.
