Event Summary

Creating Compassionate Communities Conference 2024

On Wednesday 30th October, Phoenix Support and Advocacy Service is celebrating our 40th Anniversary and is proud to be hosting our second Creating Compassionate Communities Conference: Ending the Blame Game Shame.

Our Creating Compassionate Communities Conference will include the latest sector research and solution focussed conversations about challenging and confronting issues. We hope to begin to turn the tide on victim blaming so that victims feel supported, not shamed. Its time we come together as a community and End the Blame Game Shame.

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Learn more about the Conference Presenters:

Dr Alec O’Connell

Conference MC (morning)

Dr Alec O’Connell was appointed as the 7th Headmaster of Scotch College in September 2010.

He was the foundation Head and CEO of Trinity at the University of Western Australia and held the positions of Executive Director, Vice Chancellery and Executive of Academic and Student Services at The University of Notre Dame Australia. He was the WA Chairperson and a member of the National Board of the Australian College of Educators.

Dr O’Connell is a Fellow of the Australian College of Educators, the Australian Institute of Management and the National Association of University Colleges and Halls, and a Life Member of Trinity Residential College at the University of Western Australia. Dr O’Connell has a Doctor of Business Administration from the University of Western Australia where he investigated the concept of values congruence and its effect on organisational commitment. He also holds a Diploma of Teaching, Bachelor and Master of Education, Graduate Diploma of Language Studies and Diploma Royal Society of Arts London. He has provided a number of guest lectures on the topic of leadership and values and the creation of innovative learning spaces.

He is currently Chair of Telethon Speech & Hearing, Chair of the Board of Directors of the Association of Independent Schools in WA and a Director of the Independent Schools of Australia. He is a Director of the Perth Symphony Orchestra Board, a member of the UWA Business School Ambassadorial Committee. He currently chairs the External Advisory Board of the School of Health Sciences at the University of Notre Dame.

Conference Speakers

Professor Andrea de Silva

Presentation | Examining community attitudes and beliefs about child sexual abuse and victim blaming in Australia and beyond – where do we need to direct our attention?

Andrea is the Director of Knowledge Generation, Research and Evaluation at the National Centre. Andrea has over 25 years of experience working across diverse areas of public health, prevention, social justice and inequalities. She is skilled at researching, co-designing and evaluating solutions to complex social problems informed by lived experience, data, evidence and practice-based knowledge.  Andrea has led research teams in top tier universities and previously held roles as Research Director in public sector and NFP organisations. Bringing her own lived experience and expertise, Andrea also shines a light on aspects of marginalisation, discrimination, and cultural and racial diversity. She has published over 150 research articles and reports, presented internationally, and is an adjunct Professor at Monash University.

Dr Jessica Taylor

Presentation | Victim Blaming

Jessica Taylor is a British author and campaigner. She wrote the 2020 book Why Women Are Blamed For Everything. She has made appearances on British television, including BBC Two documentary Womanhood, and in the true crime documentary My Lover, My Killer, which aired on UK’s Channel Five.

Dr Taylor began volunteering with domestic violence victims before earning a Bachelor of Science Hons degree in psychology from the Open University. Upon receiving her degree, she co-founded The Eaton Foundation, a Male Mental Health and Wellbeing Centre in the UK, with Alex Eaton. She eventually founded VictimFocus, which she describes as “a company designed to challenge and change the victim blaming practices in social care, policing, mental health and support services all over the world.

In 2019, Taylor completed her PhD in psychology from the University of Birmingham with a thesis titled “‘Logically, I know I’m not to blame but I still feel to blame’: exploring and measuring victim blaming and self-blame of women who have been subjected to sexual violence.” While working towards her doctoral degree, she was appointed to Chair of the Parliamentary Conference on Violence Against Women and Girls. Upon finishing her doctoral research, she became a Senior Lecturer in Criminal and Forensic Psychology at the University of Derby. She was later recognized for her “contribution to the psychology of victim blaming of women, her work in mental health and her contribution to feminism” by the Royal Society of Arts.

In 2020, she self-published her thesis as a book titled Why Women are Blamed for Everything. Based on three years of doctoral research and ten years of practice with women and girls, the book focuses on the reasons why society and individual psychology blames women for male violence committed against them.

In 2022, she published her second book, Sexy But Psycho: Uncovering the Labelling of Women and Girls through Constable. She described it as a “mixture of academic research, history, psychology and real-life stories of women and girls who have been told that they are mentally ill, instead of being listened to”. Dr Taylor’s book the ITIM (Indicative Trauma Impact Manual) is the world’s first completely trauma-informed manual of its kin, designed to indicate, respond to, and understand every kind of human trauma and emotion.

Dr Jessica Taylor regularly appears on national and international television to discuss violence against women and girls, psychology, victim blaming, mental health and trauma. She also writes screenplays, drama, social experiments, and proposals for TV programmes. Dr Jessica Taylor has been the chartered psychologist on several TV programmes, to advise producers and commissioners on programming about women’s rights and male violence.

Dr Talyor grew up on a council estate in the UK where brutality and coercion were normalised, and where substance abuse was a day-to-day occurrence. Now one of the the UK’s most spirited advocates, Dr Taylor share her own personal journey for the very first time in her latest Sunday Times bestselling book “Underclass”.

Professor Leah Bromfield

Presentation | Interactive Session with Professor Patrick O’Leary

Professor Leah Bromfield is an internationally-recognised and award-winning researcher in the field of child abuse, neglect, and sexual abuse. She has held a range of leading positions, including her current role as Director of the Australian Centre for Child Protection and Chair of Child Protection at the University of South Australia, where she has led the application of contemporary evidence, research and a public health approach to lead major reforms to respond to the epidemic of child maltreatment.

Prof Bromfield works closely with the government on establishing and implementing child welfare reforms, including serving on the governance and advisory committees for Safe and Supported: The National Framework for Protecting Australia’s Children, and the National Strategy for Preventing and Responding to Child Sexual Abuse. She was the Professorial Fellow to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse established by the Australian Government and a Commissioner for the Commission of Inquiry into the Tasmanian Government’s Responses to Institutional Child Sexual Abuse. She is the Chair of the South Australian Government’s Child Protection Expert Group, which is spearheading the transformation of South Australia’s child protection system.

She has authored more than 250 commissioned reports, academic, policy, and practice papers, including on the causes and impacts of child sexual abuse, child safe organisations, mandatory reporting, best practice responses to children interviewed by police, children displaying harmful sexual behaviours, therapeutic treatment and responses to child sexual abuse, child protection and out-of-home care. The impacts of Professor Bromfield’s research, support of government reform, and assistance to Inquiries and Royal Commissions has been profound with lasting national and international changes to law, policy and practice. Her innovation, expertise and leadership has been extensively recognised and she has received several awards for her work, including the National Telstra Business Women’s Award for Public Sector and Academia in 2017, and multiple awards for innovation and impact.

In addition to her significant traditional academic track record, Prof Bromfield has been awarded in excess of $20 million research income over the course of her career. Prof Bromfield is currently Co-Chair of the Advisory Group for the National Strategy to Prevent and Respond to Child Sexual Abuse.

Professor Patrick O’Leary

Presentation | Interactive Session with Professor Leah Bromfield

Professor Patrick O’Leary is an internationally recognised researcher on social work, gender-based violence and child protection having worked in numerous international universities as well as conducting complex research projects in over a dozen countries. Over the last 30 years he has being doing research with survivors of child sexual abuse with particular interest on male survivors and a focus on disclosure and life course effects.

Professor O’Leary is currently Co-Lead of the Disrupting Violence Beacon at Griffith University, as well as a Chief Investigator for the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Elimination of Violence Against Women where he leads a work stream on perpetrators and bystanders. He is the Co-Chief Editor of International Social Work published by SAGE it has become a Q1 journal and more than doubled its impact factor to 2.2.

Professor O’Leary has worked with UNICEF, Terre des hommes and Islamic Relief Worldwide. He was commissioned as an Expert Academic Advisor to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse and was a member of the Queensland Women’s Safety and Justice Taskforce. Professor O’Leary serves on numerous boards and advisory positions in the government and non-government sectors including being on the Advisory Group for National Strategy to Prevent and Respond to Child Sexual Abuse for the Australian Government, non-executive Director of DVConnect, and member of the Practice Advisory Committee for Survivors and Mates Support Network.

Professor O’Leary is currently a member of the Advisory Group for the National Strategy to Prevent and Respond to Child Sexual Abuse.

Louise Lamont

Conference Host and MC for Panel Discussion

Louise Lamont has held senior positions in the community services sector and with State and Federal Governments in the fields of family and domestic violence (FDV), child sexual abuse, sexual assault, and family law. Louise is an experienced trainer delivering to allied professionals and the Judiciary. Louise was a key advisor for the ‘Freedom From Fear’ mass media community education campaign. While working in Canberra, Louise supported the development of Family Relationship Centres, and national social justice networks. Louise has authored publications related to FDV screening and assessment, collaborative partnerships, and best practice for working with FDV.

Louise was appointed CEO of Phoenix in 2015, and her background includes earlier work as a clinician, counselling survivors experiencing complex trauma, along with perpetrators of domestic violence. Louise set up a clinical supervision and professional development program for three hundred staff across eleven metropolitan and regional sites. She was a founding member and Convenor of the Domestic Violence Action Groups of WA, a peak body that successfully advocated for social justice and policy reform, collaborative practice, community education, and the funding of FDV counselling support services, helplines, and men’s behaviour change programs.

Louise has been a member of State and National committees addressing social justice challenges and recently was appointed for a further two years to the Advisory Group for the National Strategy to Prevent and Respond to Child Sexual Abuse. Louise was also a member of the Reference Group for the WA Sexual Violence Prevention and Response Strategy and is a longstanding member of the WACOSS Children’s Policy Advisory Council.

Julie Woodhouse

Phoenix Chair

Julie was appointed to the Phoenix Board in 2014 and has been Chair since 2018. Julie is recognized as a leader in the field of education and currently holds a senior leadership position as a Level 6 Principal of an Independent Public Primary School (Department of Education WA). Her primary focus in education is building capacity to ensure that all students achieve, regardless of background factors or personal circumstance. Julie has completed a Masters in Educational Management at the University of Western Australia. She also has training and accreditation in coaching and personal assessment profiling. Julie has taught at all levels and has been a deputy principal and principal in a number of primary schools.

She has been an Area Director (Midlands District), District Director (Mid West District), Director Schools (Fremantle Peel District), Director School Review (Expert Review Group), Assistant Regional Executive Director and Regional Executive Director (South Metropolitan Education Region). Julie was involved in the comprehensive Literacy and Numeracy Review undertaken in Western Australia.

She worked closely with Kim Scott on the focus area of writing in the upper primary years on the basis of her expertise in literacy research and policy, classroom teaching, school leadership and professional learning. Whilst in the Mid West District Julie developed and implemented a ‘Building Sustainable Leadership: A Coaching Model’ cross district partnership with Esperance Education District to address induction, professional learning specifically instructional leadership and succession planning for school principals. In 2008-2009 she assumed a key leadership role in harnessing the interactive and creative capability of secondary school leaders to develop, implement and embed a collaborative network to improve curriculum choice and student achievement.

Her commitment to and skill in building the capacity of others has resulted in her being invited to present to many forums including the Senior Women’s Leadership Program. In 2009-2010 she conceptualised and implemented a highly successful district wide ‘Women in Leadership’ program. Julie has been and continues to be a highly valued representative on a range of reference groups and working parties for the Department and outside agencies.