Dessie Ellis (Dublin North West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move: "That the Bill be read a Second Time."

Molaim an Bille seo. Tá an-tábhachtacht ag baint leis do mhná na tíre. I am happy to speak on this Bill and to propose it to the House. A simple Bill, it seeks to address something that is lacking in the legislation. It is not perfect, as no legislation is at this Stage, but it is worthwhile and does something to help. In this important week, it highlights the issue of domestic violence, which has claimed far too many lives over the decades. The Bill will not solve domestic violence or fix the major problems we have with addressing it, but it fixes something that needs to be fixed. The Bill deals with an anomaly in the law. Many victims of domestic violence are joint owners of properties with their abusers, be it the family home or another property. This means that the victim of the abuse and the abuser are named on the mortgage deeds. The victim is seen as part owner of a property, creating problems for some victims seeking to escape the abuse.

Under the Domestic Violence Act 1996, the victim of domestic abuse can apply for a safety, barring or protection order by either using the address of the family home or house in which the victim resides or from sheltered accommodation or some other temporary accommodation. In allowing the victim to apply from an address other than the address of the home where the domestic violence occurred, the law recognises that victims of domestic violence often do not stay in the home after applying for an order. This makes perfect sense, as the victim who has managed to seek support would be in greater danger if she or he were to remain in the home shared with the abuser. However, the treatment of victims by the State as regards their housing needs is inconsistent with that commonsensical recognition.

If victims in the situation I have outlined are in need of social housing, as many would be, they are prohibited from being considered by the local authority. The fact that the victim is part owner of a property with the abuser is considered to mean the victim does not have a housing need. This requirement makes sense for most other situations. In the case of a victim fleeing an abusive home, though, it disregards the special circumstances and the danger the victim faces in that home. Considering a person who co-owns a property in which her or his abuser resides to have her or his housing needs met by that property turns the concept of housing need on its head. A home is not a roof or four walls. It is a place where one can be safe. The law may as well consider having a better than average place to squat as being housed appropriately.

The Bill seeks to change this situation so that a victim who applies for an order shall not, by virtue of the victim's part ownership of the residence in which the applicant resides or previously resided with the respondent, be prohibited from consideration for social housing by a local authority. The Bill does not dictate that a victim must automatically get a social house. Rather, it states that a victim shall not be discriminated against based on her or his part ownership of the property where the domestic violence occurred. The Bill acts as a waiver of sorts, whereby local authorities in assessing a person's need to be considered for social housing cannot take the part ownership in another property into account where the person is a victim of domestic violence and has applied for a court order.

Yesterday, I stood with party colleagues and other Members of the Oireachtas at the Leinster House gates for a minute's silence in memory of the women and children who had died at the hands of the women's partners or ex-partners since 1996. A poignant event, it came on the International Day Opposing Violence against Women. A shocking 78 women and ten children have been murdered in those 18 years. The event was organised by Women's Aid, which laid out shoes along a blank sheet to mark a timeline of those needless and tragic deaths, flats, heels and sandals standing in silent memoriam of those stolen lives.

More than half of all solved murders of women are carried out by current or former partners. These lives, as the vigil so movingly stated, are stolen lives. They are stolen from their families, friends and communities, snuffed out by abusers who should have been stopped. A life was stolen too often because leaving was never an option.

One in five women experiences domestic violence in her lifetime. This ranges from physical, emotional, sexual and financial abuse to threats to kill, controlling behaviour, stalking and harassment. By their very nature, these are mostly crimes that occur behind closed doors, when the curtains are drawn, when the world around stops looking. However, it also happens right out in the open. We must strive to improve public awareness of the risk factors of domestic violence and encourage people to make their homes, communities and circles of friends places where this kind of abuse will never be accepted.

Unfortunately, we have a culture that subtly teaches young men everyday to do many of the things that can lead to domestic violence. This trend in our society is called the rape culture. Its name is shocking and some dismiss the idea as over the top, but the symptoms are undeniable and its effects, illustrated by those 78 empty pairs of women's shoes, are too horrific to ignore.

Rape culture is the tendency in modern culture to dehumanise, devalue and commodify women. This culture has always existed, but it has become much more obvious in the modern era with the partial successes of the early feminist movements and the 24-hour consumer capitalist culture that has sprung up alongside the Internet. While technology is not to blame, it is often the medium through which this culture finds its most vile expression. This culture is created by a tendency that normalises the idea that women's bodies are not wholly their own. It encourages the blaming of rape victims instead of rapists. It jokes about men who beat their partners. It belittles, demonises and threatens all those who challenge it. This is the culture in which our young men are growing up. Regardless of whether they are propagators of this culture or simply bystanders, they are affected by it. This is not good news for those of us who seek to end domestic violence.

I would like to speak about the emergence of street harassment. Many men will not know what this is, even though they might engage in it or laugh off harassment by a friend. Women in Dublin, in particular, are often plagued on the street. This harassment ranges from behaviour that seems innocuous in isolation to full-blown graphic sexual commentary and physical violation by strange men on the street. If one searches "#everydaysexism", one will find the most depressing barrage of experiences being shared, mostly by young women who have been sexually harassed as they go to work, socialise or spend time with their children. Some of the people sharing these stories are teenagers who are not old enough to drink, but are being sexually harassed on the street on a daily basis. A Dublin group has been set up to tell the story of street harassment in the city, a story that makes for scary reading. This has nothing to do with what a woman wears, or how she behaves or looks. She is seen as prey simply because she is a woman. Women are extremely vulnerable in a society that treats them in this way. Harassment is just the beginning. It is a major risk factor. What will a person who believes he is entitled to do what he wants to women on the street do to a woman behind closed doors?

The State has a hand in teaching young men that violence against women is in some way acceptable, or at least forgivable. It seems that every week, a woman who has been the victim of a sexual assault has to watch her abuser go free because a judge feels sympathetic to the criminal. When judges hand down fines for the most damaging and reprehensible crimes a person can commit, it is a slap in the face to the brave people who seek to have their attackers prosecuted. It tells women and girls who are victims of sexual violence not to bother pursuing the crime because the State will not punish your attackers and they will be put through the mill anyway. The truth is that 78 is the absolute minimum number of women who can be said to have been murdered by their partners or ex-partners. These are just the cases which have been solved.

In 2013, Women’s Aid received 19,694 calls disclosing abuse to its direct services and 17,254 calls to its freefone line. Those figures relate to the people who could call. As with many of our worst social issues, there are many people whose voices are not heard. We have introduced this Bill to try to make it easier for people to flee this kind of abuse. It is crucial for us to promote opposition to this kind of behaviour. It is essential that we encourage society to challenge the risk factors that lead to domestic violence. People who seek to leave and get out must be able to do so. They should be supported, validated and protected. We are seeking to do something to that end in this Bill. That we are discussing this issue in this particular week is important in the context of all these aims. The funding of support groups like Women's Aid, SAFE Ireland and women's refuges across the State has been cut directly or through local authorities. These organisations have a massive task. According to research undertaken by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights in 2012, Ireland has the highest rate of all European countries of failing to meet women’s needs when they seek assistance after the most serious incidents of violence by their partners. The figures have hardly improved over the last two years of cuts. These organisations do fantastic work to highlight domestic violence, sexual abuse and abuse within relationships.

Women's Aid recently launched a national public awareness campaign, Not Happily Ever After, to highlight the crime of sexual violence within relationships. In another report, it has set out its vision of how our society should tackle domestic violence. A major plank of that report calls for women and children fleeing domestic abuse to be given legal protection 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Women's Aid has asked the Government to sign up to the Istanbul Convention, which sets out a comprehensive legal framework and approach to tackle domestic violence, particularly against women. The convention focuses on preventing domestic violence, protecting victims and prosecuting offenders. It categorises violence against women as a violation of human rights and a form of discrimination. It requires states to make it an offence to engage in psychological violence, stalking, physical violence, sexual violence and other abusive acts. The Government should seek to ratify this convention as soon as possible. This Bill will not stop domestic violence. It will not solve the myriad of problems causing domestic violence, but it will make a small improvement in our law. If this legislation is accepted, we will show that we are on the side of victims and we will make it clear that domestic violence is not something to be tolerated, accepted or forgiven. I ask Deputies to support this Bill.

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