Stopping Family Violence has been funded by Department of Child Protection and Family Support (DCPFS) to facilitate a Men’s Behaviour Change Program (MBCP) network within Western Australia. Networks of this description exist in some other states (in NSW they are facilitated by The Men’s Behaviour Change Network, in Victoria by No To Violence) but until now the WA providers have not been bought together in this way.

The establishment of the network is an integral component of supporting the work and ongoing evolution of perpetrator programs towards a standard of excellence across the sector as a whole.

Our hope is that the development of the network will help to:

• Create a collective voice, and whole sector view, for the MBCP agencies
• Facilitate the sharing of resources, facilitators and providing quality supervision
• Promote collaborative ways of working across MBCP
• Develop close working relationships with women’s specialist services
• Develop stronger relationships with government.
• Contribute towards developing a more integrated and coordinated service system response around Family and Domestic Violence in WA.
• Create a platform for MBCP services to specialise, expand and innovate ideas and practice

Stopping Family Violence facilitated the first workshop with key members of the Men’s Behaviour Change Program Network in February 2017. All non-government members of the proposed Network were in attendance and included Communicare Inc, Relationships Australia WA, Anglicare WA, and CentreCare.

There were two key purposes to this first network meeting

1. To provide the group with a snapshot of current and emerging trends and expectations for Men’s Behaviour Change programs into the future.
2. To discuss the establishment of the MBCP Network in WA

A second consultation was facilitated with 20 providers from the women’s network to understand their perspective on MBCPs and how we can interact and support each other to ensure the safety of women and children.