INTHEBLACK May 2025 - Magazine - Page 28
F E AT U R E
“The perverse thing is that the victim survivor is guilty until
proven innocent. The burden and cost are on them to prove
it, which they can’t afford, so they just end up with the debt.”
JULIE DAL PRA, EACH
and income in their own name, or taking
the money but reporting it under someone
else’s name, Dal Pra says.
“Taking vulnerabilities into account
hasn’t been a focus in the professional
or commercial sectors. Unfortunately,
because of this, people who are not involved
in the business can still be held liable.
“We are talking about cases ranging from
millions of dollars to much smaller amounts,”
she says.
While the amounts can vary depending
on the circumstances, when the abuse
is related to director penalty notices,
the amounts at stake are usually significant.
“Where someone has been made a director
without their knowledge, usually the first
they hear about it is when there is a tax
compliance issue and they receive a notice
from the Australian Taxation Office [ATO],”
says Dal Pra.
“The director penalty notices go straight
to lockdown, meaning there’s no 21-day
period to take action. And these amounts
aren’t small.”
In the 2023–24 financial year, the ATO
issued over 26,000 director penalty notices
for company debts totalling over A$4.4 billion.
Equally divided — for example’s sake, this
is over A$160,000 per notice.
The actual numbers may be lower
and the type of abuse different, but the
impact is just as devastating.
“The perverse thing is that the victim
survivor is guilty until proven innocent.
The burden and cost are on them to prove
[financial abuse], which they can’t afford,
so they just end up with the debt,” she says.
IDENTIFYING ABUSE
The emotional toll of dealing with the legal
and financial battles, and the economic abuse
itself, can be overwhelming. It often leads
to severe hardships, such as homelessness,
lack of access to employment, a poor credit
28 INTHEBLACK May 2025
rating and long-term health issues.
This form of abuse is shockingly
common and does not discriminate along
socio-economic lines. According to
the Australian Bureau of Statistics, one
in six women and one in 12 men are victims
of economic abuse from a partner.
In New Zealand, the results are similar,
with research reporting that 15 per cent
of New Zealand women have experienced
some form of economic harm by
an intimate partner.
Economic abuse can occur alone or
alongside other forms of family violence,
including physical and mental abuse,
and has devastating consequences for
the victim survivor, says Dr Ayesha Scott,
adjunct senior lecturer at Auckland University
of Technology and senior lecturer in Finance
and Financial Planning at Griffith University.
“We know that most victim survivors
of other types of family violence, like physical
and mental abuse, also experience financial
and economic abuse — and it is a key barrier
to safety,” she says. Importantly, financial
control can be exerted over anyone. For older
people, it may involve someone they know
using emotional blackmail to pressure the
older person into giving them money
or financial control in return for access
to care or contact, Scott reports.
“It limits opportunities to live a full life,
either through a lack of financial resources
or by undermining someone’s ability to make
their own decisions about their money
and life generally,” she says.
Having financial organisations and
professionals in the sector that respond
well to disclosures or identification of
financial abuse is key to managing that
vulnerability, Scott argues.
FIXING THE SYSTEM
Financial abuse can be a tricky area
to combat because it can cover multiple
