Raising Awareness amongst Pharmacists to Spot Signs of Domestic Violence and Teaching Domestic Violence Victims to Seek Help with Non-verbal Cues or Code Words

21 Mr Zhulkarnain Abdul Rahim asked the Minister for Social and Family Development what more can be done to raise the awareness and expand the current pool of trained pharmacists to identify signs of violence among their customers.

22 Mr Zhulkarnain Abdul Rahim asked the Minister for Social and Family Development whether the Ministry will be looking into raising the awareness among domestic violence survivors to use code words or any non-verbal cues, as adopted in other jurisdictions, to seek assistance.

Mr Masagos Zulkifli B M M: I will address both the Member’s questions on family violence in this reply.

It takes a whole-of-society effort to tackle family violence. The multi-stakeholder Taskforce on Family Violence (Taskforce), which I co-chaired with Minister of State for Home Affairs, Assoc Prof Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim, released its report late last month, detailing a set of 16 recommendations aimed at improving immediate support for survivors of family violence, enhancing protection for them, preventing violence from recurring and raising awareness of early warning signs. The Taskforce’s report and recommendations, which build on the existing work by the Government and community partners in the area of family violence, seek to strengthen efforts in tackling family violence over the next few years. We do not condone violence against any person and these recommendations are intended to support all persons affected by family violence, regardless of nationality, gender, race, religion or sexual orientation. The Government is considering the set of recommendations carefully and will respond to the Taskforce’s report thereafter.

It is heartening to know that many community partners, agencies and individuals feel strongly about tackling family violence. MSF actively seeks out and collaborates with community partners and organisations to strengthen community detection of violence and refers persons experiencing violence to available support. For instance, MSF worked with Unity Pharmacy to provide Family Violence Awareness Training to over 40 pharmacists in November 2020 and more than 120 retail assistants in April 2021. The intent is to equip them with skills to detect signs and symptoms of family violence among customers who approach them for medication or advice. MSF has rolled out the Family Violence Awareness Training to more partners this year, including staff and volunteers from educational institutions, grassroots and religious organisations. These included PCF Sparkletots, ITE College Central, EtonHouse Community Fund, the People’s Association, MUIS and the Presbyterian Church in Singapore.

Beyond training various partners to recognise signs and symptoms of family violence, MSF has also worked with FairPrice and Unity Pharmacy to make available brochures and posters on family violence across their retail outlets, to reach out to customers who may not feel comfortable approaching staff members directly for help.

MSF will continue to expand our outreach to more organisations, particularly partners that are likely to have direct contact with survivors of family violence or with groups that are at a higher risk of family violence. MSF is reaching out to other pharmacies to explore such efforts and welcomes other organisations to step forward and partner us.

I would also like to thank the Member for his earlier suggestion in March this year on the use of non-verbal cues, such as a discreet "signal for help", by students during virtual lessons to indicate that they are experiencing abuse at home.

The Taskforce agrees that this is something worth doing and has included this in its recommendations. MSF has already started looking into ways to make it easier for persons experiencing family violence to signal that they need help promptly and discreetly. We will release further details later this year.