Australia's newly minted Minister for Women has been advocating behind the scenes for women in the Liberal Party for decades. But Marise Payne has her work cut out for her in this new job.

Key points: Women's advocacy groups have welcomed Senator Payne's appointment as Women's Minister

Women's advocacy groups have welcomed Senator Payne's appointment as Women's Minister They hope to see her provide long-term funding for domestic violence and legal aid services

They hope to see her provide long-term funding for domestic violence and legal aid services Senator Payne's role also includes Foreign Minister

Senator Payne, who is also the Foreign Minister, was sworn in this week and has already flagged women's safety and economic security as key priorities.

But her passion for advocating for women was clear back in 1997 when she made her maiden speech to the Senate.

"As the youngest woman in the Coalition, I am proud to join the ranks of women in Canberra," she said at the time.

"And I hope to welcome many more female colleagues here in the next few years."

Female representation remains a tricky topic for the Coalition. But women's advocacy groups have welcomed Senator Payne's appointment as Women's Minister.

Many said they remembered her from meetings about family violence and Centrelink when she was the human services minister. She made a good impression.

"We had some really good meetings with her at that point," said Moo Baulch, the chief executive of Domestic Violence New South Wales.

"I know that she understands the depth of some of these issues and in that sense it gives me real hope."

As a result, Ms Baulch said she had high expectations of Senator Payne in her new role.

She wants to see more long-term funding for domestic violence services, a government commitment to implement the recommendations of the national inquiry into sexual harassment, and an overhaul of the Family Court.

A record number of women will sit in Scott Morrison and Michael McCormack's Cabinet. ( ABC News: Andrew Kennedy )

"There are hundreds of thousands of people who can tell you horror stories of the violence that has occurred as a result of going through that [Family Court] system," she said.

"It's urgent. We really need to tackle this and look at this through a trauma-informed lens."

Attorney-General Christian Porter tried to merge the Family and Federal Circuit courts before the election, but could not secure crossbench support.

Now that the Government is getting back to work, Ms Baulch is hoping Senator Payne will advocate a cautious approach to such a sensitive issue.

"There was absolute fear and horror expressed last year when the Attorney-General talked about amalgamating the courts," she said.

"That certainly is not the way forward in my opinion.

"But I think it's very, very complex."

Chief executive of the Women's Legal Service in Queensland Angela Lynch said consultation in that process was vital.

"[The Family Court] really does need to be fixed up in relation to how it responds and there needs to be a real statement and understanding that women and children who are victims of violence turn to this system for protection," she said.

"At the moment … that understanding does not exist."

She said the Government also needed to provide more money for frontline services that were increasingly overwhelmed.

"We are unable to answer 40 per cent of calls to our statewide domestic violence helpline," she said.

"We answer about 8,000 a year, so that's another 3,000-4,000 on top of that that aren't getting through.

"The need is enormous."

The national president of the Country Women's Association, Tanya Cameron, said these problems were magnified for women in rural and remote areas who often had to travel for hours to reach help.

"Sometimes the issues are the same, but the services and the access to services in rural and remote areas are often hard to find … whether that's in relation to domestic violence or housing affordability or even the availability of housing," she said.

As Foreign Minister, Senator Payne already has a demanding role and spends a lot of time overseas.

Senator Payne is also the youngest woman in Scott Morrison's Coalition. ( ABC News: Ian Cutmore )

But Helen Dalley-Fisher from the Equality Rights Alliance said she believed the two roles could complement one another.

"There is a lot of work being done internationally around the status of women and around dealing with entrenched gender problems," she said.

"So she's perfectly positioned to actually tackle some of those issues in a way we haven't seen until now."

Ms Dalley-Fisher said that might include more action on domestic violence.

But she also hoped Senator Payne would also expand former foreign minister Julie Bishop's work to introduce gender targets across the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

"We'd be looking at for example the Department of Trade to consider, when they're making grants or developing policy, whether or not there's an opportunity here to increase outcomes for women or to address gender gaps in some way."