Dr. Clíona Saidléar:

This is part of the data we are seeking. When we speak about transparency, we would like much more data as we do not have anything but anecdotes on this because of the nature of family law and how it is conducted. We have anecdotes that raise the question of how many such cases there are. This begins to intersect with Tusla, the Child and Family Agency. We must examine how Tusla engages on the question. As I have said, if there is a 96% failure rate for child sexual abuse that is disclosed and is probably true, if some of the cases end up in family courts, how are they being handled? Tusla has a system of categorising the 3,000 referrals in terms of risk management as "founded" and "unfounded". It does not disclose and there is no public data on what percentage of these cases it deems to be founded and unfounded. Therefore, what it sends to family courts, how it behaves with respect to the courts and the information it gives would depend on how the cases are categorised as either founded or unfounded. Tusla's policy around how it treats an unfounded case varies. There is not a standard way of handling the risk assessment and such cases naturally would always need to be individualised. There would need to be an individual response to such cases.

On the question of whether we can end up with a situation where there is child sexual abuse in a private family case, we would say "Yes" for all the reasons we have mapped out here. What is critical for us to know is whether we can begin to log this, put a number on it or count it. We think there is much that is hidden. As Ms Counihan said with respect to alternative dispute resolution, we do not know how many such processes involve people in cases of coercive control and domestic violence who make a calculation that it is easier to compromise. We do not know to what extent the cases that are long and protracted, where people will not agree, are because there is domestic and sexual violence. We are not counting these allegations that are parts of these cases. That is not to say they are true but that they are part of the case.