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This overview provides a snapshot of the MARAM, to review the full MARAM and additional resources, refer to the MARAM website which is managed by Family Safety Victoria.
The objectives of MARAM are to:
- increase the safety of people experiencing family violence
- ensure the representation of a broad range of experiences across the spectrum of seriousness and presentations of risk, including for Aboriginal communities, diverse communities, children, and across varying family and relationship types
- keep perpetrators in view and hold them accountable for their actions and behaviours
- guide alignment with MARAM for use across a broader range of organisations and sectors who will have responsibilities to identify, assess and respond to family violence risk
- ensure consistent use of MARAM across these organisations and sectors.
There are three foundational elements of MARAM. These are:
- the 10 MARAM Framework principles that underpin practice across the service system
- four pillars to support organisations to align their policies, procedures, practice guidance and tools with MARAM
- the 10 responsibilities for practice that describe the roles and expectations of framework organisations.
MARAM creates a shared responsibility between prescribed services and sectors. This shared responsibility uses tools based on evidence-based risk factors. It also shares relevant information to reduce risk. This approach provides more options to keep victim survivors safe and perpetrators in view and accountable.
MARAM acknowledges children as victim survivors in their own right. MARAM provides specific evidence-based risk factors and tools to help identify and assess family violence risk to children.
MARAM works with the Child Information Sharing Scheme (CISS) and the Family Violence Information Sharing Scheme (FVISS). These schemes let practitioners access a wide range of information to identify risk. The CISS allows a prescribed information sharing entity (ISE) to share information that promotes the wellbeing or safety of a child or a group of children. The FVISS enables authorised workers to collect, use and share relevant information about victim survivors, perpetrators, alleged perpetrators and other people involved in family violence.
MARAM Framework requirements for each pillar
Demonstrate understanding of:
- family violence risk and impact
- spectrum of family violence types
- complexity of experiences in community (intersectionality)
- use of the evidence-based risk factors to support determination of risk.
Apply consistent, collaborative practice through use of:
- MARAM tools to screen, identify, assess, manage family violence risk
- FVISS or other laws to share information
- structured professional judgement
- victim survivor self-assessed level of fear
- evidence-based risk factors
- information sharing and collaboration
- own professional judgement.
Organisational leaders:
- understand their organisation's responsibilities in family violence risk assessment and management
- understand responsibilities that relate to the operation of the information sharing scheme
- equip their workforce with the tools, resources and training to meet those responsibilities.
Contribute to understanding of the evidence base by:
- establishing governance to oversee alignment
- collecting consistent information about the evidence-based risk factors from use of the tools and client feedback
- leading change management activities to promote continuous improvement.
MARAM practice responsibilities and levels of practice
| Practice responsibility | Relevant practice levels |
|---|---|
| 1. Respectful, sensitive and safe engagement | Identification, Intermediate, Comprehensive |
| 2. Identification of family violence | Identification, Intermediate, Comprehensive |
| 3. Intermediate risk assessment | Intermediate, Comprehensive |
| 4. Intermediate risk management | Intermediate, Comprehensive |
| 5. Seek consultation for comprehensive risk assessment, risk management and referrals | Identification, Intermediate, Comprehensive |
| 6. Contribute to information sharing with other services (FVISS and CISS) | Identification, Intermediate, Comprehensive |
| 7. Comprehensive assessment | Comprehensive |
| 8. Comprehensive risk management and safety planning | Comprehensive |
| 9. Contribute to coordinated risk management | Identification, Intermediate, Comprehensive |
| 10. Collaborate for ongoing risk assessment and management | Identification, Intermediate, Comprehensive |
The 10 MARAM Framework principles
To help achieve a shared understanding of family violence, there are 10 MARAM Framework principles to support each pillar and help guide Victoria’s family violence system-wide response. The principles are:
- Family violence involves a spectrum of seriousness of risk and presentations, and is unacceptable in any form, across any community or culture.
- Professionals should work collaboratively to provide coordinated and effective risk assessment and management responses, including early intervention when family violence first occurs to avoid escalation into crisis and additional harm.
- Professionals should be aware, in their risk assessment and management practice, of the drivers of family violence, predominantly gender inequality, which also intersect with other forms of structural inequality and discrimination.
- The agency, dignity and intrinsic empowerment of victim survivors must be respected by partnering with them as active decision-making participants in risk assessment and management, including being supported to access and participate in justice processes that enable fair and just outcomes.
- Family violence may have serious impacts on the current and future physical, spiritual, psychological, developmental and emotional safety and wellbeing of children who are directly or indirectly exposed to its effects, and should be recognised as victim survivors.
- Services provided to child victim survivors should acknowledge their unique experiences, vulnerabilities and needs, including the effects of trauma and cumulative harm arising from family violence.
- Services and responses provided to people from Aboriginal communities should be culturally responsive and safe, recognising Aboriginal understanding of family violence and rights to self-determination and self-management, and take account of their experiences of colonisation, systemic violence and discrimination, and recognise the ongoing and present-day impacts of historical events, policies and practices.
- Services and responses provided to diverse communities and older people should be accessible, culturally responsive and safe, client-centred, inclusive and non-discriminatory.
- Encourage perpetrators to acknowledge and take responsibility to end their violent, controlling and coercive behaviour, and service responses to perpetrators should be collaborative and coordinated through a system-wide approach that collectively and systematically creates opportunities for perpetrator accountability.
- Family violence used by adolescents is a distinct form of family violence and requires a different response to family violence used by adults because of their age and the possibility that they are also victim survivors of family violence.
MARAM responsibilities
Requirements: Understands the nature and dynamics of family violence, facilitate an appropriate, accessible, culturally responsive environment for safe disclosure of information by service users, and to respond to disclosures sensitively. Recognises that any engagement of service users who may be a perpetrator must occur safely and not collude or respond to coercive behaviours.
Requirements: Uses information gained through engagement with service users and other Specialist homelessness services (SHS) (and in some cases, through use of screening tools to aid identification/or routine screening of all clients) to identify indicators of family violence risk and potentially affected family members. Understands when it might be safe to ask questions of clients who may be a perpetrator, to assist with identification.
Requirements: Competently and confidentially conducts intermediate risk assessment of adult and child victim survivors using Structured Professional Judgement and appropriate tools, including the Brief and Intermediate Assessment tools.
Where appropriate to the role and mandate of the organisation or service, and when safe to do so, competently and confidentially contributes to behaviour assessment through engagement with a perpetrator, including through use of the Perpetrator Behavioural Assessment, and contributes to keeping them in view and accountable for their actions and behaviours.
Requirements: Actively addresses immediate risk and safety concerns relating to adult and child victim survivors, and undertakes intermediate risk management, including safety planning.
If working directly with perpetrators, attempts intermediate risk management when safe to do so, including safety planning.
Requirements: Seeks internal supervision and consults with family violence specialists to collaborate on risk assessments and make active referrals for comprehensive specialist responses if appropriate.
Requirements: Proactively shares information relevant to the assessment and management of family violence risk and respond to requests to share information from other information sharing entities under the Family Violence Information Sharing Schemes.
Requirements: Trained to comprehensively assess the risks, needs and protective factors for adult and children victim survivors.
Trained and equipped to undertake comprehensive risk and needs assessment to determine seriousness of risk of the perpetrator, tailored intervention and support options, and contribute to keeping them in view and accountable for their actions and behaviours. Has an understanding of situating their own roles and responsibilities in the broader system to enable mutually reinforcing interventions over time.
Requirements: Trained to undertake comprehensive risk management through development, monitoring and actioning of safety plans (including ongoing risk assessment), in partnership with the adult or child victim survivor and support agencies.
Trained to undertake comprehensive risk management through development, monitoring and actioning of risk management plans (including information sharing); monitoring across the service system (including justice systems); and actions to hold perpetrators accountable for their actions. This can be through formal and informal system accountability mechanisms that support perpetrators’ personal accountability, to accept responsibility for their actions, and work at the behaviour change process.
Requirements: Contributes to coordinated risk management, as part of integrated, multi-disciplinary and multi-agency approaches, contribute to coordinated risk management including information sharing, referrals, action planning, coordination of responses and collaborative action.
Requirements: Plays an ongoing role in collaboratively monitoring, assessing and managing risk over time to identify changes in levels of risk and ensure risk management and safety plans are responsive to changed circumstances, including escalation. Ensures safety plans are enacted.