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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 27 April 2016
Over 20 years ago, the Australian Liberal/National Party Federal Opposition had a set of policies with which it hoped to persuade the Australian people to return it to government in the election due in 1996. This particular collection of proposed initiatives was called “The things that matter”. When the then leader of the opposition, Alexander Downer (later Australia's Foreign Minister 1996–2007 and now Australian High Commissioner in London), launched the Opposition's policy on family violence (the Coalition parties, like their Labor opponents, were and are against it in principle), his introductory line was: “From the things that matter to the things that batter”. Not long afterwards he lost his job as Opposition Leader, his engagement with what was and is a serious and troubling issue having been deemed too glib by half by the shapers of public opinion.