Ms Patricia Rickard-Clarke:

We need a system working from the ground up. Some of the reporting does not happen early enough. It is really that whole education around safeguarding at every level and then, where the thresholds come in, mandatory reporting, or hybrid reporting in certain circumstances. Hopefully, the Law Reform Commission will have detail on what should be reported mandatorily and what are the hybrid elements. Again, looking at Australia and other countries, there can be a lot of reporting that is not related to abuse and, therefore, the system gets clogged up. It is very important that we have a clear and efficient system for reporting that works, as I said, from the ground up.

Some people are afraid in terms of staffing and all of those issues, so we have to be very clear about sharing information and intersectoral collaboration. In some areas, one organisation may be aware of abuse and it should be necessary to share that either with the Garda or another organisation, where a person is suffering abuse in different contexts.