Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House and I also welcome this legislation.

In an era in which members of the public only ever see politics in an adversarial way, with its over and back, criticisms, bun-fighting, drama and theatre, I believe Deputies on both sides of this House should be proud of tonight's proceedings. We have a progressive piece of legislation from Sinn Féin in the names of Deputies O'Reilly and McDonald that was first moved a year ago. It today comes to the House for a Second Reading and the Minister gave a generous response to the legislation and has received sanction from the Cabinet to move on the measures within the Bill. There may be a small level of disagreement as to how best to proceed but politics works best when the Government shows a level of generosity towards a piece of legislation from the Opposition. I know that the Minster for Justice, Deputy McEntee, is working well with my colleague, Deputy Howlin, on the Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Bill. We can work collaboratively to improve the lives of the people who sent us here to work for them.

I will refer to a study that issued on 25 November from Women's Aid. It contains a national survey that gives a picture of the seriousness of the issue that has already been outlined by many Deputies this evening. Ms Sarah Benson of Women's Aid said:

The findings of this national survey show us that we have particularly alarming levels of intimate relationship abuse experienced by young women in this country. One fifth of young women said they experienced abuse which included emotional abuse, physical violence and sexual assault, stalking and harassment. Based on our 2016 CSO data this is as many as 44,540 young women (18-25) which is shocking. Even more troubling is the fact that 51% of young women who had suffered abuse said that it began before their 18th birthday, with just 18 years old being the average age at which the abuse began.

Often when Opposition spokespersons stand up, they speak of a lack of movement from Government parties on an issue. That cannot be said in this case because the Domestic Violence Act 2018 has proved quite successful. From what I have heard from the agencies to whom I have spoken and the people involved in this sector, there is not really a call to fill legislative gaps, this legislation aside. Rather, there are issues within the system, including the courts system. Court issues remain such as the fact that a different judge in family law courts often presides over a particular issue within a case. Funding and resources can be patchy from county to county, as the Minister will appreciate. There is potential there for us to work better.

This is an issue of power. It is a gendered issue and I think it is fair to say that men are the majority of the problem here. I listened with great interest to what Deputy Carroll MacNeill had to say about the cultural background to the issue. She mentioned how it can feel to drop one's children to school and hope that there will be some element of education within the school building to challenge this type of dynamic and power imbalance. All of us have to challenge some of the norms that we have inherited in this country and see if they stand up to scrutiny.

I have touched on the following issue before and there does not seem to be much of an appetite to change what I am about to speak to. We should be serious about eliminating all the elements in our society that lead to gender inequality and situations where there can be a warped sense of power, particularly within men. That has not been confined to history and anybody who speaks on an issue that predominantly affects women will be contacted by men of all generations who have a warped sense of their role in society. We have a disproportionate number of schools in Ireland that are segregated on a gender basis. Some 17% of Irish primary school children attend single-gender primary schools. That is not a huge amount but it is completely out of kilter with the European norm. One third of our second level schools are single gender. Nobody can convince me that part of the problem is not the fact that we disproportionately separate children on the basis of their gender in the education system. The Department has not given sanction to a new single-gender school since 1998. It is not Department policy to give any new school that status and it has not happened for more than 20 years. However, one third of young people attend second level schools that are either all-male or all-female.

What people say to me when they try to defend the system is that girls do better in all-girl settings. That, at least, is the accepted, passed-down understanding of why they should be supported. I think that assumption is open to challenge because what happens with all-male and all-female second level school settings is that these issues of domestic violence, power, sexual assault and image-based sexual assault among young people cannot be challenged when students are being taught in two different buildings and not learning in the same space. A toxic masculinity can grow in a single-gender male school. I am not in any way suggesting that every school is like this, or that it is not called out in all-male second level schools, or that considerable efforts are not being made in all our educational facilities to stamp out this type of toxic viewpoint or attitude. However, when compared with progressive countries in Europe and around the world, the idea of unquestioningly pursuing this accepted norm of separating children on the basis of gender does not stand up to scrutiny. It leads to a society that is very gendered and views the other gender with a slight level of curiosity or insecurity. It leaves people lacking an ability to interact properly. Within that can arise a situation where power and dominance are sought. An entire school that is built around a dressing room culture of what boys say to boys and young men say to young men has to be challenged.

I do not say this in order to be provocative or destructive. I say it because it is worthy of us to always drill down into the root causes of toxic masculinity and explore why the issue appears to be getting worse in Ireland. Women's Aid has illustrated that many young women are suffering. People born since the year 2000 are going through this so it is not an old phenomenon that we are still dealing with from old attitudes. I have no idea how much time I have left.

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