Women’s safety advocates have raised concerns about the appointment of rightwing Queensland MP Amanda Stoker as the state’s minister for the prevention of domestic violence in light of her resurfaced statements that people should not “blindly” believe women who make allegations of violence.Stoker, who was appointed to the role on Saturday, argued in a 2023 article that the recent push to believe complaints “rather than carefully assess[ing] relevant evidence” would harm innocent defendants. The former federal senator, has repeatedly supported the rights of people accused of sexual assault and implied some were subject to “false allegations”.Former Australian of the year Grace Tame, who in 2021 criticised Stoker’s appointment to the federal outer ministry, said the appointment was “disappointing”.Stoker’s appointment this week was welcomed in public by some in the community sector.

Guardian Australia has also spoken to several people who work in Queensland supporting victims of domestic and sexual violence who said they had private concerns about Stoker taking over the portfolio, which includes responsibility for the child safety system, after the resignation of Amanda Camm.None would speak publicly, in an environment where support organisations say they’ve been warned not to criticise the government, and others have had public funding cut. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s Politics, really newsletter here Stoker made a public name for herself as a young conservative warrior, becoming a headline speaker at anti-abortion rallies who was chosen for the Senate in 2018 with the backing of the Liberal National party’s faction of “Christian soldiers”.She left the Senate in 2022 and was elected to the Queensland parliament in 2024.In a 2023 opinion piece published by independent thinktank, the Menzies Research Centre, Stoker raised concern about victim-focused reforms to the criminal justice system, including changes that allow the media to name accused rapists before they go to trial.She said the changes removed “a small protection against the harm done to an accused’s reputation from adverse publicity in cases so weak that they don’t even meet the standard necessary to go to trial”.“In our sincere desire to ensure that victims are treated with respect and dignity and are able to achieve justice, so-called ‘reforms’ have been proffered that would permanently undermine our justice system in a way that harms everyone,” Stoker wrote.“What I do know is that the push for us all to blindly ‘#believeher’ (or any witness) rather than carefully assess the relevant evidence is prone to cause great harm to those defendants who are innocent.”Stoker has repeatedly made comments over several years that suggest false allegations of sexual assault are made.

She told Sky News in 2019, in relation to universities’ handling of sexual assault allegations: “we don’t want to see victims harmed, but we also don’t want to see people harmed by false allegations”.Research has established that false allegations in sexual and domestic violence cases are rare.The Queensland Police Service, on its website, says there is “no evidence that many women make vexatious reports” of sexual violence and that the rate of false allegations is “very low”.“This myth about false allegations is harmful for society and harmful for victims of sexual offences,” the QPS says. “It contributes to under-reporting. And victims wrongly fear they will be met with disbelief and blame if they report.”The CEO of Full Stop Australia, Karen Bevan, said “what leaders say about sexual violence is heard by every person deciding whether to tell someone what happened to them”.“Victim-survivors need to know that if they come forward, they will be believed, supported and taken seriously,” Bevan said.“In Queensland, 92% of women who experience sexual assault never report it to police.“Believing someone when they disclose is not the same as deciding guilt.

Police still investigate, and courts still test the evidence. A fair trial and a system that victim-survivors trust can, and must, exist together.”Stoker’s office did not address specific questions sent on Tuesday, including whether her prior statements were consistent with the state government’s promise to put “victims at the heart of government”.

A spokesperson said there was broader context to the minister’s prior comments. They also said that the minister has a legal background and “cares deeply about procedural fairness in all cases”.The spokesperson said the minister was “looking forward to engaging with, supporting, and hearing from all stakeholders and organisations within the new portfolio remit and supports the policy direction of the Crisafulli government, as she has consistently done since the government was elected”.Stoker also did not respond to questions about whether she supported safeguarding measures to support victim-survivors, including the ability for some to give evidence from a “safe room”.In her 2023 piece, Stoker wrote that removing “the right to face one’s accuser” or the ability to fully test evidence in court would “increase the number of innocent people who will be punished for crimes they didn’t commit”.Tame said Stoker’s appointment was “very disappointing, considering that as we know that sexual, family and domestic violence in Australia is only worsening. “Amanda has essentially played into the overarching gaslighting that is directed at victim survivors,” Tame said.