'Women don't feel safe': PM's gender champion calls for action

"Women don't feel safe, and there is something really urgent for us to do about it," Ms Raman, appointed to lead the newly-created office in the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet last year, said at a post-budget dinner on Wednesday.

In her first public comments after attending the National Cabinet meeting on gender-based violence called by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on May 1 along with Domestic Family and Sexual Violence Commissioner Micaela Cronin, Ms Raman said while there was "a genuine commitment to this issue", the strategy that emerged was "a to do list".

"There's a lot to do ... We have to completely take that momentum around what the community is feeling and what the media spotlight is ... because we cannot afford to continue to have the rates of violence against women," she said.

Ms Raman said it was "slightly astounding for people like me who've worked in the field for a long time, that the media have just started to recognise it as an issue ... when in fact, it's been a problem for a long time."

"If you don't make progress on violence against women, balancing unpaid care, women's economic security, women's health and women's participation in decision making and leadership, you're not going to get to gender equality," she told the Future Women post-budget dinner.

Speaking on a panel with Women in Economics Chair Angela Jackson and Australian Banking Association chief executive Anna Bligh, Ms Raman welcomed the groundswell of interest, but said more work was needed.

"We need to find explanations for why the homicide rate has gone up in the last year," she said.

While previously a woman was violently murdered every week in Australia, new data shows the rate of fatal attacks almost doubled to a woman being killed every four days this year.

Tuesday's budget included some funding for women's safety - including $925 million to make permanent and expand a program giving women fleeing violence up to $5000 in financial support - but it did not lift the base rate of JobSeeker.

Dr Jackson said it was "disappointing ... that we didn't see another movement in that space" after the government lifted the unemployment benefit by $40 a fortnight last year. She said violence against women cost the nation's economy about $50 billion a year.

"The link between poverty and violence is causal," Dr Jackson said. She said the JobSeeker base rate remained "grossly inadequate" at $762.70 a fortnight - half the OECD average - and was "a big driver of poverty amongst women".

"It is causing a lot of economic harm and social harm ... particularly for women who need to rely on it so there wasn't that continuation [of violence]."

Minister for Women Katy Gallagher said while the government had made positive changes towards gender equality - with budget measures including superannuation on its paid parental leave scheme - there was more to be done.

"We're going to keep working at it," she told the audience.