Sharon Keogan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for her statement today. I spoke after our recess about how the media coverage of the senseless murder of Ashling Murphy caused so many people to be aware of it and started so many national conversations around the treatment and experiences of women in this country. The flipside of this, of course, is that so often the long-term issues and the constant problems do not make the headlines yet these too must be part of the conversation. I do not think that we are experiencing an epidemic of male violence and that there has been a surge in violent gender-based crime. I am open to being wrong on that front; I simply have not seen the figures to that effect but I know that women suffer every day in this country. It is the case that this suffering will never make the headlines because of the simple fact that it goes unreported, unseen and unknown.

Domestic violence is one of the most horrific experiences that anyone can live through. To have one’s own home, which should be a place of safety and peace, become a place of fear and tension goes against every sense of what is right and just. There will always be more work to be done in combating this crime and everyone has a role to play. Everyone should know the signs of possible abuse happening to friends or family members and they should not be afraid to contact An Garda.

For Government, funding is the bottom line. We have nine counties without crisis refuge centres for people fleeing domestic violence and that needs to be rectified. There was no dedicated line of funding in this year’s budget for domestic, sexual and gender-based violence. That must change. Services in this area must be maintained and developed and not depleted or damaged in any way. There should be a higher income threshold for free legal aid for those who require such aid to assist in cases against abusers. We need to facilitate women’s escape from these situations and many women feel that they do not have the means to do so. As has been spoken about over these past few weeks, instances of violence like this do not exist in a vacuum. We need to ask what in our society and in our modern culture brings someone to the stage whereby this behaviour is displayed. What are the building blocks that lead to this?

At the end of the day we can get bogged down in attacking all sorts of facets of Irish society, from male sports to single-sex schools but I believe that that is missing the point. Ultimately, it comes down to respect and to honour. These are two virtues which I feel have been sorely lacking for some time now in our culture. We can do a great deal by instilling a sense of respect in the inherent dignity of every person in our schools. Respect has to be much more a part of what is said at school during the day. Respect has to be part of every situation, every day, both in dealing with children and when children are dealing with each other. We cannot learn to give and show respect if we are not taught it and schools have a very significant role to play in this. New programmes which deal with respect should be introduced to our schools, first explaining and showing the child what respect is, giving examples of it, and pointing out why this is called respect.

Programmes have to include strategies for dealing with inappropriate behaviour towards all people, regardless of gender. All the programmes in the world will be of severely limited use if their messages are being undermined at home. A child can hear respect in school but if they do not see it at home they will never live it out. How do we react in situations of upset, disagreement or dispute? How do we treat people with whom we disagree? Do we interrupt them, shout them down or refuse to listen to another point of view, as happens in this Chamber? Might we choose to honour, to show respect, to engage and, perhaps, work through our differences to the betterment of all? I do not want to see the women of this country merely not being subjected to violence. I want to see them honoured and respected. That is not going to come through legislation, a citizens’ assembly or a “Prime Time” investigation but will come about through the choices that each and every one of us make every day.

A public representative who had gone through the process with regard to violence has raised a number of issues with me about how we might make things better. She wanted to know if it was right that the victim’s medical records should be available in a sexual offences or rape trial? Why is it that the victim of rape or sexual assault can have their privacy violated in such a manner but an offender, on release into the community, has a right to privacy regarding his address?

A “Do not Disturb” sign on the meeting rooms in our Garda stations if a victim comes forward to make a complaint is another such suggestion. These are little things that we can change.

The victim should also be provided with a copy of their statement, as the accused to gets to see it but the victim does not. There should be a clear explanation available to the victim at the Garda station outlining the process involved and legal advice should be provided from the outset. We have a long way to go to protect women and hopefully this is the start of it.