Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute on this debate on behalf of the Labour Party. The survey sadly confirms the high prevalence of sexual violence in Ireland. It is shocking, but not surprising, to read that 28% of men and 52% of all women experience sexual violence over the course of their lifetimes. This publication comes in the wake some years ago of the Sexual Abuse and Violence in Ireland, SAVI, report, which perhaps first disclosed the true extent and prevalence of DSGBV. It also comes in the wake of the much more recent Women of Honour report, which exposed the horrific sexual harassment and intimidation experienced by members of our Defence Forces.

We see in this survey, as we saw with the SAVI and Women of Honour reports, that there is a gendered dimension to this violence and that DSGBV is, unfortunately, all too prevalent in Irish society, as it is in other societies. Sadly, this is an international phenomenon. In Ireland, we have a particularly dark history as regards the treatment of women and the downplaying, and even dismissal, of sexual violence against women and children. That situation persisted for far too long. We are all thinking of the various carceral institutions in which women and children were confined for many decades, for example, the Magdalen institutions, the mother and baby homes and the industrial schools, in which much violence was perpetrated, but this survey highlights that the issue persists even after those institutions have happily been closed down and that there is still much more work to be done.

I pay tribute to the Minister without Portfolio, Deputy McEntee, who has done a great deal on DSGBV. The third national strategy was an important step forward. I know how closely stakeholders, front-line advocates and services worked with the Department of Justice and other Departments to try to achieve a clear pathway to the necessary reforms to address DSGBV.

The Joint Committee on Gender Equality, which I was proud to chair, examined the issue of gender-based violence. In particular, we examined the important recommendations of the Citizens' Assembly on Gender Equality. I pay tribute to the citizens who decided to include DSGBV within the remit of their deliberations and report. Their recommendations, and our action plan based on those recommendations, have to be actioned. Since we engaged with the Minister, Deputy McEntee, on the report, I know there is a commitment to doing so. That is important. We were considering the citizens' assembly's report in the aftermath of the horrific killing of Ashling Murphy in January 2022, which again shone a most awful light on the pervasiveness of sexual violence and, indeed, gendered violence in Ireland.

Despite the statistics that we are discussing, as disclosed by the CSO survey, the seriousness, frequency and pervasiveness of sexual and gender-based violence has been played down for far too long. It is almost never treated as the human rights abuse and human rights crisis that it is. It is the fault of our criminal justice system that incidents are often seen as isolated or that victims are even regarded as being complicit in some way. That has been a terrible undercurrent to many of our criminal justice procedures and rules for far too long. Some years ago, I had the opportunity to work with the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre on an EU-funded study of rape laws and trial procedures. We published that in 1998. At the time, we found there were hugely gendered assumptions and so-called rape myths that underlay much of the criminal law. For example, the rules around evidence specific to rape and sexual offence trials required corroboration of complainants' evidence and enabled defendants to bring in evidence of prior sexual experience, which is still the case.

While we have done a great deal and there has been important legislation - I should also mention the former Minister for Justice and Equality, Ms Frances Fitzgerald, MEP, who did much to reform our laws on domestic violence and sexual offences in 2017 - there is still far too much gendered violence. The statistics in this survey leave us wondering what we can do further to ensure that the next generation - our daughters' generation - will not be subjected to the same levels of sexual violence and everyday harassment experienced by me, my peers and generations of women before us.

It is especially important that we, as legislators, reflect on the specific gendered impact on women of sexual violence. The Ceann Comhairle has highlighted this as an issue among women public representatives. There has been a welcome disclosure about the levels of gendered abuse that women in public life endure. Misogyny is endemic in society; it cuts through all levels. As always, the least powerful are the most severely and adversely impacted, and women are in the least powerful positions, which is true across the world, not just in Ireland. We must address this issue and cannot just assume that it will not continue. The #MeToo movement has done a great deal to expose the reality of women's gendered experiences of harassment and violence. The common strand across the #MeToo movement and all the work being done by many important groups such as the NWCI and rape crisis centres is the imbalance of power between women and men in society - the patriarchal structures that enable violence, harassment and everyday intimidation to continue. That power imbalance must be redressed. We need to recognise the harm done by sexual violence and the way in which it not only contributes to the power balance, but is also caused by it.

We therefore need to adopt an approach that cuts across Departments and across society to ensure that educational measures are adopted and that, as early as the preschool stages, girls and boys are taught to be respectful of one another in order that we can build a society where women and men are truly equal. The understanding that underpinned the gender equality report and the deliberations of the Citizens' Assembly on Gender Equality was that sexual, domestic and gender-based violence cannot be seen or addressed in isolation from other aspects of gendered experience and gender discrimination in society.

I will wind up by acknowledging the positive changes that have been made and by underlining a few of the really important measures that need to be taken. I again pay tribute to those who have done so much to move forward our understanding of domestic, sexual and gender-based violence. I refer to organisations like Women's Aid and the rape crisis centres. I particularly commend Noeline Blackwell, the outgoing head of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre, for all her work. She is now stepping down but she has done a great deal through her own advocacy to highlight issues and the changes that need to be made.

I particularly note that the positive changes to our criminal trial processes and to our support systems were largely brought about because of the brave women and men who have spoken out about their experiences as victims and as survivors. We have seen really powerful advocates speaking from their own personal experience. Despite these positive changes, there are still key issues that need to be addressed. I will now highlight some of them. Under-reporting and case attrition are very significant problems and have been for as long as I can remember while working in the criminal justice service. We see these issues again in this survey. Less than half of adults, 47%, who experienced sexual violence in their lifetime told someone about it. The rate is lower again for reporting to the Garda. We still need to do a great deal to encourage higher levels of reporting and to ensure there is no attrition after the reporting stage, that is, that cases are not redesignated. A classic instance of this we have come across a great many times is where a woman reports a rape but this is then downgraded to another sexual offence in the statistics. This shows attrition even between the reporting and recording stages.

We know there are also great difficulties with regard to disclosures where violence is inflicted by an intimate partner, the so-called domestic violence context. That is a real problem. Again, through different legislation, particularly in 2017 and 2018, we have sought to ensure that intimate partner violence is recognised as particularly pernicious and that it is addressed. Some years ago, the Oireachtas justice committee did an in-depth study of the laws and procedures around domestic violence. One of the issues that really stood out to me from the testimony of the witnesses and survivors who spoke to us was the question of why they were the ones to need refuges. Clearly, we do need refuges. We need to see more investment in refuges. Progress has been far too slow. This is one area where there has been very valid of criticism of Government, which has been far too slow in rolling out refuge spaces. However, there is also the question of why it is the women and children who have to leave their homes when we see violence perpetrated. Why have we not turned our system around to ensure that perpetrators lose their homes where they are guilty of violence and human rights abuses within a family? Traditionally and for far too long, abuses within families have been seen as not worthy of the same level of response from a criminal justice perspective. That must change. I will finish by again saluting the bravery of those who participated in this study and those very many survivors who have told their stories and helped to change our society.

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