Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Murnane O'Connor. She mentioned the Amber Women's Refuge. The Chair of this committee has me fully across all of the work it does. She has been in touch on a number of occasions to sponsor her and I fully expect that that will happen again. The Amber Women's Refuge has great support from all of the local Deputies and Senators in the area, just as Aoibhneas has in my own area. We have engaged with the refuges, because that is where this information needs to get to.

Deputy Murnane O'Connor touched on interesting point. As a general rule, when there is a new form of leave, there will be an information campaign. That will usually involve the relevant Department producing the leaflets, the posters, the information and making sure that that gets to the level of the workplace. The Deputy raises a very good point, which is that we should be looking beyond that, by getting the information to the level of the refuge as part of the information campaign. I am sure that we have all engaged with the people who are running the refuges. You will always see an information table or an information stand that has leaflets in the refuges. We will need to get the information there. That is important and that is a useful suggestion. As part as any information campaign, when there is a change, there will generally be national advertisements, as well as local. They will not just happen at the level of the workplace. One will generally have national advertisements.

The biggest barrier that will be faced, which I fully accept, is that employers might be nervous about taking this on. They may wonder how they will afford it. That has to be part of the awareness campaign. It is not just a case of "How can we afford it?" It is a case of looking at, as Deputy Murnane O’Connor says, the work done by Amber and the other organisations on what the actual costs are. It will be about looking at how much it costs, as well as how much it will cost to implement it.

Although we talk about domestic abuse and gender-based violence as an epidemic or endemic, we also need to remember that these are small numbers at the level of a workplace. This means, therefore, that we will not see mass disruption within each workplace. However, we need to listen to employers if they are nervous. We need to be able to go to where they are at and have that conversation with them. We need to do this in the context of the actual costs at the level of the workplace to the employer, as well as the cost to the people who are working alongside the victims and survivors when there are unexplained absences.

If someone finds themselves in this situation and has exhausted annual leave entitlement, they may be required to attend court, go to a doctor's appointment, attend an appointment with their solicitor or whatever. If they have exhausted their leave and do not have any other option, they will find themselves having to ring in at the last minute. That is very disruptive, whereas with this leave and with the provision of this leave, absences can - not always because of the nature of the leave and how it may have to be taken at short notice - be planned. This means that an employer can plan. It means that they will be able to mitigate against any potential impacts. However, I fully respect the fact that there may be nervousness and anxiousness on the part of employers. The committee will hear not just from workers, but employer representatives and they can speak of their fears, as well as talk about the positive way that they want to approach this. I have not encountered any negativity coming from employer representatives on this.