Policy

The multiple intersections of mental health and elder abuse are complex, including both the mental health of the older person and the mental health of those who perpetrate elder abuse.

Seniors Rights Victoria provides a helpline and an advice service to prevent and respond to elder abuse. We have analysed data from these services to better understand how the lockdown restrictions in Victoria affected the clients – and potential clients – of our service.

This de-identified information has been collected for all advice call clients over a seven-year period (July 2012 to June 2019) and analysed to better understand elder  abuse within Victoria.

Callers to our service often ask why there is no requirement that a person report elder abuse, similar to mandatory reporting frameworks that exist in other countries or in other contexts, such as child protection.

This discussion paper explores the ways gender and sexual identity can affect an individual’s experience of elder abuse, mistreatment and disrespect. It also includes a discussion of the often under recognised crime of sexual assault of older women.

This discussion paper explains how elder abuse is a form of family violence, and draws attention to its unique causes and characteristics.

Seniors Rights Victoria’s position, drawn from available evidence and our casework experience, is that we have sufficient laws in place to address elder abuse, but these laws lack effective implementation.

This study aimed to better understand the older person’s experience of elder abuse, the interventions used to address elder abuse and the outcome of the intervention for ex-clients who contacted Seniors Rights Victoria (SRV).