Mr. Pádraig Dalton:

This is not an area of expertise for us as we have never undertaken a survey of this nature. I met with Rape Crisis Network Ireland at one stage to discuss how one might go about doing this and collaborate nationally with such an entity such to help us with the fieldwork.

The discussion at EU level is how one ensures one collects accurate information on this topic which is a sensitive and difficult area. One can imagine going into a household to collect this information, talking about domestic violence when the perpetrator may be there. There is much research going on in this area. Some proposals are that it is much better to do this through computer-telephone interviewing, rather than doing it the traditional way of calling to the door with a laptop or a palmtop collecting the information face to face. It has been suggested the best way to do it might be with telephone or web-based interviewing.