Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)

I followed this up myself since I joined the Dáil in 2016. We had a task force in 1996 and Eithne FitzGerald was the Labour Party Minister at that stage. Ever since, we have been playing catch up. I am not reassured that the Garda now has courses in place. It was acknowledged by the Garda when it was before us at the public accounts committee recently and further details will be sent to us on the improvements that would be made. Women's Aid tells us its own services are overstretched and underfunded.

I am lost for words because I have spoken about it so often. The level of violence is horrific. We should drop the word "domestic". There are not even refuges in each county. In a sense, that is the wrong way to be going. We have to go that way but that removes the woman from the house as opposed to the offender.

One of the top recommendations from the task force in 1996 was that we needed to have an intervention strategy in relation to the perpetrator. That has never happened and the figures have grown exponentially despite all the strategies and legislation.

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