CATHERINE FITZPATRICK'S STORY.

CATHERINE
FITZPATRICK

Founder + Director of
Flequity Ventures

““I believe in the power of collective action for positive change. ”

Ideas and advocacy are more compelling when there’s collaboration…and what may appear to be unlikely partnerships. When we bring different expertise, creativity and connections together to make change for good, it amplifies and accelerates our efforts.

To me, being a Change-Maker means thinking differently, embracing the uncomfortable, creating unlikely partnerships and having the courage to try something new. Something delivered with a bit of the unexpected.

It means respectfully challenging the status quo and walking alongside those who have the power to change the products and processes and systems, with a gentle nudge to try something different. I hold a deep belief in gender equality and equity. I’ve always spoken up for fairness; I remember challenging my high school economics teacher to stop preferencing the boys in our class, as well as starting the school newspaper with a focus on HIV/AIDS in the first edition, as the Grim Reaper campaign was in full swing.

My first professional role was as a journalist – I was taught to keep asking the next question, to see injustice. I’m always listening deeply. Everyone has a story. Everyone. You just need to ask. As social welfare reporter, my job was to give a voice to the voiceless and speak truth to power.

In 1994, I was a police rounds reporter for the West Australian newspaper. We heard that there had been a shooting at a house in the northern suburbs of Perth. It slowly emerged that a man had shot his two children dead before turning the gun on himself. His estranged wife was in hospital with serious injuries. She had lost a leg.

The following year, I contacted the woman via support services and asked if I could tell her story. She agreed and it was the first time she spoke to a journalist. It was probably one of the most uncomfortable conversations I have ever had. It was the horror of her experience; the grace with which she told it; the fact she was the same age as me; and this sense of guilt for my privileged life.

Meeting Ann O’Neill affected me profoundly. She had suffered a brutal crime and lost so much. But there was this incredible, quiet strength about her. Since then, she has become an anti-gun and survivor advocate, completed a PhD, and set up her own charity, Angelhands, to help victims of crime.

Her experience was the catalyst for my work as chair of Commonwealth Bank’s domestic violence working group, and now as a social entrepreneur. We still stay in touch. I am profoundly grateful for her wisdom and guidance in the work I do.

SYSTEMIC SUPPORT
FOR THOSE EXPERIENCING
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE.

When Rosie Batty challenged everyone in society to play a role to end domestic and family violence, I was fortunate to work for an organisation that was open to it.

In 2015, I took the lead and set up a working group at Commonwealth Bank. The starting point was to listen deeply to people with lived, living and learned experience – victim-survivors, the women’s safety sector and consumer advocates – to ask, what is our role? Then, to methodically examine what we could and should do for our people, our customers and our community.

In 2019, one of my team showed me abusive messages in the transaction description of a customer she was assisting to disentangle from a violent partner. I asked my team of data scientists to investigate. After analysing 11 million transactions in a three-month period, they found 8,000 customers had received concerning messages which included threats, abuse, harassment and intimidation. These were sent for as little as one cent and often involved repeated payments over a short period of time.

After consulting experts and the eSafety Commission, we took action to block these messages and to provide greater support to the recipients. I also took what we had found to the Australian Banking Association, which led to all banks committing to move on this form of tech-facilitated abuse.

All major banks now block inappropriate language in real time – Commonwealth Bank has blocked over a million transactions since 2020. Some monitor for the patterns of abuse, others provide reporting functionality so recipients of the messages can seek support. Two banks have reported that 90% of people who are issued a warning letter about the behaviour, stop sending abuse through payments.

“That’s millions of customers who no longer have to put up with abuse in their bank accounts.”

Nearly 10 years later, all Australian banks have moved on domestic and financial abuse. I’m proud of the work I’ve led that has catalysed banks to respond to tech-facilitated abuse through payment descriptions, and to change terms and conditions in bank accounts to make financial abuse an unacceptable behaviour. It’s systemic, anchored in what customers have said they need to better protect and support them, and builds on the legacy of many, many people who have been working in women’s safety for decades.

BETTER
#TWOGETHER.

Business is now starting to better understand they need to listen to people with lived and living experience, both as employees and as customers, and to take action to respond. The community expects them to deliver profit with a heart. That means paying attention to people experiencing vulnerability and providing support that’s more flexible, safe and equitable.

It's going to take a long time before we achieve gender equality. That’s why I support measures that level the playing field, and give people a helping hand. When there’s structural inequality and marginalised groups are even more disadvantaged, then we need organisations to do more to help.

I’ve followed Two Good Co since its inception and admired how a simple concept can have such a big impact; giving people hope, respect and economic security. I once visited for an event they catered, hosted by the NSW Advocate for Children and Young People – an intimate lunch to introduce young women changing the world, to some of us who’ve been pushing on those doors for a bit longer. It was also the same day the government agreed to include consent in the school curriculum, so it was very special to celebrate with Chanel Contos, and to know where the food had come from.

I’ve since bought gifts for my teams and my clients, and always include a message about the work they do.

“Their value is not just for every individual that they help, it’s also the change they’re making to our society, in the long term.”

ABOUT
CATHERINE.

Catherine is Founder & Director of Flequity Ventures, a social enterprise which aims to empower business to disrupt financial abuse and gender bias through more flexible, safe and equitable product and service design.

A former bank executive, Catherine was recognised nationally in 2018 as an AFR|Qantas 100 Women of Influence for her leadership of Commonwealth Bank’s domestic and family violence strategy. A career highlight was instigating analysis that found patterns of abuse in payment descriptions in 2019, and successfully advocating for the Australian banking industry to take collective action to respond.

She is the author of Designed to Disrupt, first published by the Centre for Women’s Economic Safety in 2022, which has led 13 Australian banks to ban the misuse of products for financial abuse. Her second paper focused on general insurance will be launched in March 2024.

Catherine advises the Commonwealth Government as the only business representative appointed to the National Plan Advisory Group and is Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of New South Wales School of Social Sciences.