Séamus Healy (Tipperary South, Independent)

I support the motion and compliment Sinn Féin Deputies on tabling it. I have a particular interest in the area of domestic violence, having been associated with a service for victims of domestic violence since the early 1990s. While mayor of Clonmel, I became a patron of Cuan Saor, the main organisation providing services for victims of domestic violence in south Tipperary. I have been associated with it ever since and I am currently a director of its board. I compliment and thank everyone working in Cuan Saor, including its chairperson, Kaye Hyland, and her board, and the manager of services, Geraldine Mullane, and her staff who do an excellent job in difficult circumstances.

Cuan Saor provides a full range of services, including a helpline, counselling, outreach services, court accompaniment and advice and guidance. We also provide a refuge which was established in 1998-99. Domestic violence services require serious levels of funding and resources. In the past four to six weeks, Cuan Saor has been carrying out an assessment of the services we have provided over the years and is drawing up plans for the service we will provide over the next three years. At every hand's turn in this process the absence of sufficient funding, resources and staff to provide an adequate service to people in south Tipperary who have been affected by the crime of domestic violence has emerged.

One of the points made in the motion tells us all we need to know, namely, that in 2005 more than one third of all calls to the Women's Aid national telephone helpline went unanswered due to inadequate funding. I plead with the Minister to provide proper funding for domestic violence services, for which funding has effectively been capped since 2002. We need to modernise services and properly fund and resource them.

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