“It’s Not My Job”: Why Every Service Supporting Women and Children Has a Role in Addressing Domestic and Family Violence Perpetrators

Perpetrator BehaviorSystems Change
Written By Jessica Sisler

By Jackie Wruck, SW, Asia Pacific Regional Manager, Safe & Together Institute

“I only work with adult survivors. I’m not funded to work with perpetrators. It’s not my job.”

I hear this in training rooms across Australia. It’s usually said by caring practitioners who are protecting clients affected by domestic and family violence (DFV) and working within tight funding rules.

But it rests on a false choice. Being perpetrator pattern–based means keeping the perpetrator’s behaviour, and its impact on the children, at the centre of assessment and planning. It does not mean sitting in a room with him. Every practitioner who supports a survivor or child is already working with the impact of his behaviour.

What Happens When Perpetrator Behaviour Is Out of View

When the perpetrator is out of view, three things happen:

  • The focus lands on her. Questions become “Why won’t she leave?” instead of “What is he doing, and how is it harming the children?”

  • Safety plans get weaker. We cannot plan around a risk we have not described.

  • Children’s harm is missed. His use of the children, his undermining of her parenting, and the housing, income, and school disruption he causes stay hidden.

Systems also hold parents to a double standard. Services routinely ask mothers about the children’s health, schooling, and routines, and rarely ask fathers the same questions. That keeps the spotlight on her and away from him.

How Does the Safe & Together Model Give Every Practitioner a Role?

The Safe & Together Model starts from one position: when domestic violence is the concern, the perpetrator and his behaviour are the source of the risk to children. The risk does not come from the survivor, or from “the relationship.”

Its three principles give every practitioner a role, whatever their funding:

  1. Keep children safe and together with the protective parent.

  2. Partner with the protective parent as the default position.

  3. Intervene with the perpetrator to reduce risk and harm to the child.

Intervening does not have to mean direct work. It includes what you ask, what you write, what you share, and what you advocate for. The Model also frames his violence as a parenting choice, which moves it out of the “adult issue” box and into child and family functioning. That makes it everybody’s business.

6 Ways to Address Perpetrator Behaviour Without Working With Perpetrators

1. Gather his pattern through her

You already hold most of what you need. When it is safe, ask:

  • “What does he do when he is angry with you?”

  • “How does he talk to the children about you?”

  • “What happens when you try to get to appointments, work, or family?”

  • “How does he limit your freedom or ability to make your own decisions?”

  • “Has he behaved like this with past partners or others?”

Look for violence, threats, financial and emotional abuse, undermining her parenting, and using the children against her. Naming his behaviour also validates her. It counters his messages that she won’t be believed or isn’t a good enough parent.

2. Name her protective efforts out loud

Try: “We understand that you have been taking steps to keep yourself and the children safe in the face of his behaviour. Can you tell me more about them?”

Then record them. Keeping the children fed, at school, and loved while living with abuse is protective parenting. It belongs on file.

3. Connect his behaviour to the children’s wellbeing

When a child is anxious, aggressive, or missing school, ask what his behaviour has done to cause or worsen it. One part of the Perpetrator Pattern Mapping Tool asks three questions:

  • How has his behaviour traumatised the children?

  • How has it disrupted the household, such as housing, income, school, and contact with family?

  • How has it affected her parenting, such as her energy, authority, and routines?

4. Pivot in case discussions

When a meeting starts with “She keeps going back to him,” use the three-step Safe & Together pivoting protocol:

  1. Validate the worker’s worry for the children.

  2. Pivot to him: “What do we know about his pattern, and what has anyone done about it?”

  3. Return to her: “Given what he is doing, what does she need from us to keep the children safe?”

5. Write his behaviour into your records

Your notes travel to courts, child protection, and other services. Make them show who is creating the risk.

Instead of... Write...
“Mum is not engaging with the service.” “Mr. X has taken Ms. Y’s car keys and phone, which has stopped her attending three appointments.”
“Child exposed to DV.” “Mr. X strangled Ms. Y in front of Jack (6). Jack now wets the bed and refuses to sleep alone.”
“Mum failed to protect.” “Ms. Y moved the children to her sister’s and applied for a protection order after Mr. X’s threats.”

6. Share and advocate, even if you never meet him

  • Share his pattern with police, child protection, and family law partners, with her consent or within your state or territory’s DFV information-sharing laws, and only after considering how sharing could affect her safety.

  • Recommend specific bail and protection order conditions, such as no contact through the children.

  • Ask referrers and case managers: “What is the plan for him?” and push for men’s behaviour change referrals.

  • Hold both parents to the same standard by asking what the father is doing for the children too.

One Action for Your Sector

Sector Action
Health Record missed appointments, injuries, and untreated conditions as possible results of his control, not her non-compliance.
Alcohol and Other Drugs (AOD) Ask whether he has encouraged her use, sabotaged treatment, or used her substance use to threaten child protection reports.
Education When a child’s behaviour or attendance changes, ask the protective parent what is happening at home and who is causing it.
Legal and Family Law Use his documented pattern to argue for contact arrangements and orders that protect the child’s relationship with the safe parent.
DFV Services Add a “his pattern” section to intake and safety plans, built from her account.
Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisations Map how he uses community, kinship, and cultural ties to monitor or isolate her, and plan with family and Elders where safe.

How Is Perpetrator Pattern–Based Practice Being Used in Australia?

Queensland’s previous Walking With Dads approach used the Safe & Together framework to make fathers who use violence visible and accountable, while partnering with mothers and children. It included guidance for culturally safe work with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families. Survivor services that share what they know about his pattern help make that intervention safer and better targeted.

The ALFIES research with Waminda South Coast Women’s Health and Wellbeing Aboriginal Corporation and Katungul Aboriginal Corporation Regional Health and Community Services explored whole-of-family approaches through an Aboriginal lens on the Safe & Together framework. For many families, keeping him in view is part of keeping the family and community safe and connected.

Why Perpetrator Behaviour Is Everybody’s Business

You may never be funded to work with perpetrators. But the impact of his behaviour is already in your room: in her exhaustion, the child’s nightmares, and the missed appointments. Seeing it clearly helps you partner with her, protect the children, and stop the system from placing his responsibility on her shoulders.

As the title of David Mandel’s book puts it, we need to stop blaming mothers and ignoring fathers. Accountability for the harm to children and family functioning rests with the person causing it: the perpetrator.

Additional Resources

Jessica Sisler
Next

Culture and Domestic Abuse: Bringing an Intersectional Lens to Child Welfare Practice