Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Solidarity)

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

In starting the debate on my Bill today, I am thinking in particular of the family of Annie McCarrick who disappeared 33 years ago but only now is a man being arrested in relation to that crime. Obviously, women do not disappear; something has to happen to them. We recall many other women in the 1990s who just suddenly disappeared and the State was very slow to investigate in the way it should have. I also think of the family of Tina Satchwell. For many years, justice was denied to that family and Tina was maligned. These are cases that have come up only this week. I am also thinking of the family of a teenager who allegedly suffered a sexual assault in the Ballymena area and the disgraceful way racists are using that, the issue of gender-based violence, to be racist. These are pressing issues in society.

I begin by thanking the survivors in the Gallery and especially the therapists who have come here, some from Galway and all over the country, because they really wanted to make the point that they are deeply troubled at this law which compels them to break the client relationship and to break confidentiality and to go against everything therapy is meant to stand for in doing so. I really want to thank them. This week, 60 professionals wrote to the Ministers for Health and justice and made these points very strongly, which I will talk about shortly. We have to begin with the scale of violence against women, girls and LGBT+ people in the world.

Women's Aid has had a record number of disclosures, as have all of the rape crisis networks. We know that the police have had a huge increase in reported crime as well and we know that the WHO and the United Nations class gender-based violence as the biggest threat to the health of women and girls in the world today. Such is the importance of this issue.

Sexual violence and abuse are deeply traumatic for victims and survivors. I use the terms interchangeably because not everybody wants to be classed as a victim or just as a survivor. For many, the impact can be wide-ranging and life-changing. Therapists have told me how, unfortunately, sexual violence is linked with eating disorders, self-harm, poor physical health, poor mental health, depression and, of course, suicidal ideation as well. Often therapy is the only avenue that people have to seek a way to try to cope and to deal with those issues. What the presence of being able to access somebody's counselling notes does is it completely disrupts that and they have to make a choice between seeking therapy for the horrific crime committed against them or going to court. It is one or the other. As I reported today, there is a teenager who has left the child and adolescent mental health service, CAMHS, because they heard in the media that this can happen to people and they had to decide they were not going to participate any further in it. That is a horrific situation and the Government should be moving might and main. In reality, it is a bizarre Bill to have to bring forward, particularly because we have an epidemic of gender-based violence.

It is estimated that 5% of people report their experience of sexual violence and only 14% of them ever get to court. Even then, the conviction rate is really low. What do we do? For those who brave those hurdles, we actually put them through a gauntlet of misogyny including things such as character references, victim blaming, what they wore, what contraception they used, if any, if they drank and if they took drugs. On top of it, their therapy notes - something to help them - can be seized by the defence. It is absolutely barbaric that we do this to survivors who go to the trouble of going to court. It is particularly cruel.

On First Stage, I mentioned some of what survivors have said about this experience but I will give the Minister of State some examples quickly. Sarah, a survivor of an incredibly violent attack, said that in so many ways she found her trial more traumatic than the attack. Can Members imagine saying that? She said she would take the attack again before having to set foot back in that courtroom. The Minister of State should let that rest with him that survivors are telling us this. The most heart-breaking obstacle of all, she said, was the seizure of her counselling records. After her body being violated, our courts of justice are allowing a second violation. In fact, they ordered a second violation of her mind. It was a brilliant way of describing this experience. Another survivor, Hazel, said that she worked to rebuild herself to get to know the new her. She talks about the benefit of counselling with the rape crisis team and then to find out that the perpetrator could know her thoughts, her fears, her shame and her turmoil shared during the safety of her counselling sessions. So many survivors have testified to this.

We have this phenomenon, which is to be welcomed, whereby survivors come out onto the court steps and wave their anonymity. They speak about their experience because they do not want it happening to somebody else.

Is the Government listening? What has changed in the past few years? We still have all of the rape myths, all the victim blaming going on by the Judiciary every day, and people not having their own autonomy and their own representation.

The way that this has worked in recent times is the onus is put on the victim to give their notes. Only the other day, I was told that the Garda basically said, "Hand them over because if you do not, it will delay your trial."

It is absolutely despicable the Government has decided that, rather than allowing this Bill progress and dealing with it as the Minister wants to on Committee Stage by putting whatever amendments, it has decided to put a year's block on this progress after it promising for years to deal with this issue. Obviously, I cannot anticipate what the Minister of State will say as to how he defends that but it is indefensible because he could easily work with this Bill.

No evidence whatsoever is procured from a therapy note. Some of what I have heard is that this could be unconstitutional. The right to a fair trial is extremely important - something I would defend to the death - and it is strong in the Constitution. However, there is nothing of evidential value in a therapy note. That is the key point. Therapy notes are only being used, as misogynistic tropes, as a way to undermine the complainant, to demean them, to worry them and to demean their character as well - to find a nugget in there.

I spoke to some therapists beforehand. They were making the point that a person, particularly somebody who was abused as a child or who may have got into a certain situation, could end up in counselling saying, "I blame myself." That would be seized upon by the defence. The Minister of State knows it would and yet we are allowing that to be done. People can blame themselves for ending up - and also because it is often a way of dealing with the situation that they are partly to blame. These are the ways that counselling notes can be abused.

I have spoken to representatives from the rape crisis centres as well. One of the points they made is, how is this even allowed? These are third-party notes. They are not even the notes of the person who is making the complaint. We do not know how reliable a therapist could even be as to what those notes are. The truth is that there is no other reason for this. We know that there has been an escalation in requests for these notes. It is clearly related to the fact that the defence sees the possibility because we know that misogyny is rife in society, among juries and in the Judiciary, and they know that if they can find something it can be a way of strengthening the defence's case.

In the US, there is therapist-and-client privilege so that if somebody goes in, it is a safe space for them to talk. That is the way it should be in Ireland or it should be certainly similar. What else is counselling but this? We need a similar situation here. The Supreme Court made a judgment recently which strengthened the idea that there is no requirement for these notes to be used in gender-based violence trials.

The other point that is made is that this would be unconstitutional and we cannot allow this go through. The Constitution has a right to privacy. It has a right to health. If we even say that there is a conflict of rights, why are all of the rights being given in one way? I am very confident on this if the Minister drafted a good piece of legislation and if somebody challenged that, then fine, let us have a referendum. In fact, most people are horrified when you explain this to them. They do not even know that this exists in our courts.

As I have said, more than 60 therapists, and professionals, psychotherapists, psychologists and psychiatrists in many different fields, have written this week. The Psychology Society of Ireland is adopting this now as its policy. The RCSI is looking at the exclusion of counselling notes also being part of its policy. The Irish Council for Psychotherapy is also. I welcome that the people who are trying to heal those who have been damaged by gender-based violence are taking this.

This is a health issue. The cost to the health service, by the way, of allowing people not have therapy is very high.

Now is the time to completely eliminate this. The Minister indicated that he may get rid of the waiver and introduce a very high bar for these notes to be accessed and that there would have to be a hearing. That is not good enough.

The mere fact that their counselling notes could be accessed is enough to deter people from seeking counselling and going to court and enough to cause real fear, particularly where there is a relationship with coercive control, intimate partner violence or child sexual abuse. It is not enough to try to have this halfway house. We have to rebalance this in favour of those who are victims of gender-based violence.

For the past couple of years, Simon Harris, Micheál Martin and Helen McEntee have said that this should be outlawed. Suddenly, they then changed their position to saying it should be amended. Sometimes, one has to stand up to the Judiciary or whoever is telling us otherwise and say there is no evidential value in this. No one has ever given me one example of where a therapy note was vital to somebody's right to a trial.

We have an epidemic of gender-based violence. We can recite all the figures repeatedly. We know what an explosive issue this is in society. We just have to look at what is happening in the North right now, where people have been able to use such an emotive issue to stir up hatred against minorities. At a time when we are urging people to come forward and speak out, we are assailing them with a gauntlet of misogyny. Our legal system is highly patriarchal and rooted in the idea of male entitlement to women's bodies. It reinforces that with the likes of the idea of counselling notes being used. The Minister could make a name for himself and be the first Minister to take this off the agenda. It would be a positive thing that he could do to deal with gender-based violence, something that the Government has promised for so long. He could not just go along with the easy option, as we know this issue is going to arise again and again, as happened with repeal and the X case. If one tries to find the easiest thing to do, the issue will not go away.

It is shameful that the Government has taken this position in the face of what is such a pressing issue. I will certainty urge all parties and TDs to reject the Government amendment.

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