Ivana Bacik (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank all of the presenters for their very useful contributions which have followed the very powerful contributions that were made here last week. I noticed some common themes such as the need to ratify and sign the Istanbul Convention, the habitual residence condition and how homelessness is linked to the issue.

The last point made by Ms Harling referred to training for gardaí which takes up the point made by Senator Mulcahy last week that gardaí need to be more pro-arrest in their approach to domestic violence and remove the perpetrator. We might deal with this issue.

I want to focus on some of the newer points that were made today and which we did not hear last week, particularly on sexual violence and rape. Ms O'Malley-Dunlop and Ms Counihan have both put forward detailed proposals for statutory change concerning rape and other sexual offence laws. What do they think would be the single most important change to tackle this real problem of attrition rates in sex offence cases? The definition of "consent" is one element, but is there a more practical issue? If so, what is the single biggest change that could tackle the difficulty?