Financial Control In Relationships Isn’t Talked About Enough: “We Have To Unpick The Patriarchy”

When we talk about consent, most of us think about sex. Schools teach it, parents attempt awkward conversations about it, and social media debates it endlessly. But according to financial abuse expert Catherine Fitzpatrick, there’s another kind of consent we’re not discussing nearly enough, and it could shape our lives just as profoundly. “I’ve had plenty of conversations with my children about sexual consent,” Fitzpatrick said during a recent panel discussion at the Sydney Opera House’s All About Women event. “What it is, how you ask for it, how you give it freely, how you can take it away. We don’t have the same conversations about money — and we should.”

It might sound surprising at first. But once you start thinking about it, the parallels are difficult to ignore. In relationships, money can be treated as something that should automatically be shared, or quietly managed by one person. But as Fitzpatrick argued, financial decisions, like sexual ones, should be informed, freely given, and reversible. Because when consent around money isn’t clear, the consequences can be devastating. Financial abuse is one of the least understood forms of domestic abuse. It can look like a partner controlling access to bank accounts, sabotaging employment, accumulating debt in someone else’s name, or monitoring spending. And in many cases, it’s built into the very systems we rely on every day.

Fitzpatrick discovered this firsthand while working as a banking executive. When her team reviewed customer accounts belonging to domestic violence survivors, they noticed something chilling — abusive partners were sending one-cent transfers accompanied by threatening messages in the payment description. In one case, an abuser sent 900 messages, one cent at a time, including threats like “I want to kill you”. What shocked her was how easily the cruelty was allowed to happen. “We realised our systems were being weaponised,” she said. “Bank accounts should be safe. It shouldn't be a place where you can send abuse to somebody else.” Her research later found thousands of serious cases of financial abuse hidden within ordinary banking transactions. “So I convinced the rest of the industry that we needed to move on this,” she said.

But banking isn’t the only industry affected. Fitzpatrick now studies how abusers exploit everything from insurance policies and energy accounts to phone plans. “Anywhere where there is a joint account, anywhere where there is online billing or you can manage your account online, it will be and it is being weaponised.” For decades, the standard solution has been basic financial literacy — teaching women how to budget, save, and invest. But many experts say that approach misses the bigger picture.

“Most women actually know what they’re supposed to do with money,” financial educator Zee Heart added. “The issue is the story we’ve been told about ourselves — that we’re bad with money.” These narratives follow girls and women everywhere. We hear messages from family, school, advertising, and culture, that suggest that money is complicated, stressful, or not our domain. Over time, Heart argued, those become internalised beliefs.

“When someone says ‘I’m bad with money,’ I ask them: whose voice is that in your head?” she said. “Where did you first hear it?” Changing financial outcomes, she argued, requires unpacking those stereotypes as much as learning technical skills. And for many women leaving abusive relationships, rebuilding financial confidence is, arguably, the most important part of recovery — because financial control is often what keeps them trapped. Research cited during the panel found many women leaving abusive relationships face an impossible choice in time: return to their abuser or enter poverty.

Organisations like the Arise Foundation aim to provide a third path — helping survivors rebuild employment, financial confidence, and independence. Programs focus not just on financial literacy but also on empowerment, wellbeing, and trauma-informed employment support. “We focus solely on that recovery and healing stage,” co-founder and co-CEO Tasnia Alam Hannah explained. “While crisis and early intervention are quite well funded, recovery and healing is not.”

Rebuilding a life after abuse often means rebuilding an entirely new financial identity. Many survivors leave relationships without bank accounts, credit histories, or savings — sometimes without even knowing debts have been taken out in their names. This is where the idea of financial consent comes in. Just like sexual consent, Fitzpatrick explained, it involves clear communication, mutual understanding, and most importantly, the ability to withdraw or say no. In practice, that might look like discussing how money will be managed before moving in together, or knowing the implications of shared debt, or, in other cases, maintaining independent finances altogether.

It essentially means recognising that healthy relationships should include these conversations. “If you're in a relationship where you cannot have those conversations, whether you feel insecure having that conversation in that relationship, or you're afraid of how the person will react, or you're afraid there will be a communication breakdown, if you ask ‘Should I bring this up’, that's a yellow, orange, or red flag,” Heart said.

“Healthy relationships are made of money conversations. There is 100% guarantee that your relationship will end one way or the other,” she continued, reminding the audience that, eventually, even death parts the most healthy of relationships. “Sometimes it'll happen in good circumstances, sometimes not, but it is so important to talk about it… because that is a core part of healthy relationships. We talk about these things, including how are we going to lovingly separate when the time comes? That’s love.”

The experts said systemic change is just as important as personal awareness, because many financial systems were designed around assumptions of stable, heterosexual marriages where men controlled finances — assumptions that no longer reflect reality. Even basic structures like joint loans can expose people to risk, Fitzpatrick pointed out. In many cases, borrowers are subject to “joint and several liability”, meaning each person is responsible for 100% of the debt, not half. If one disappears or stops paying, the other can be pursued for the entire amount.

“I have sat in boardrooms and talked about it, I’ve said ‘We have to unpick the patriarchy’. Because our systems have been built around that. To Zee’s point, I have spoken to so many widows who, when their husbands die, all of a sudden don’t have a credit card anymore,” she said. That’s why she advocates “financial safety by design” — building safeguards directly into products and services so they cannot easily be used for abuse. Ultimately, the conversation around financial consent is about something bigger than bank accounts. It’s about power, autonomy, and the right to control your own financial life. Just as the cultural conversation around sexual consent has evolved over the past decade, they argue the conversation around money needs a similar shift.

“We teach young people how to ask for sexual consent,” Fitzpatrick said. “We should also teach them how to ask for financial consent.” Because, she added, healthy relationships depend on both.