Eugene Murphy (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I was always going to find this difficult today. I am very hurt, upset and annoyed over recent developments, in particular the murders and the treatment of women. I listened to Senator Boylan and I know what happened to Senator Hoey and the lewd acts they had to witness. If I am not mistaken, one of their Fine Gael colleagues has had a similar experience recently. It is shocking and outrageous. In regard to that lewd act, I believe we should look at bringing in a serious sentence for men who would carry out such acts online or in front of any woman. It is utterly disgraceful. We do not address that issue well enough. I am sorry Senator Boylan had to go through that. It is deplorable, it is shameful and it is outrageous that any male would do that.

I want to bring it down to a very personal level. We have a daughter of 23 who teaches in this country. She teaches first class in primary school. She goes for a run almost every day. I have never spoken about what I would do and what a thousand men would do but if she was gone from home for more than an hour, running the back roads, where she could be running 10 km, I would take my car down to that area, park it and go walking, because of that fear of her or her friends being attacked by a male. I know thousands of men do that. We have a huge hill-walking area beside us which is very popular. Since this most recent tragedy, I say to my female neighbours that when I see them go running or walking at dusk, I am watching out until I see them coming back to the house, but I would never have said that to them until this tragedy happened.

The shortcoming from me and from most men is that when we were doing those sort of things to stand by women, we did not make a public debate about it. We stayed silent about it. We know that, in our own gender, there are people we cannot trust. It is mainly men.

I have huge faith in what the Minister is doing. I know she had started this new policy prior to recent events and I have no doubt she will carry it out. From a male perspective, I will do everything I can and everything I am asked, and I will help out and make suggestions.

I want to give a few statistics on this issue. As has been quoted on a number of occasions, since 1996, on average nine women per year have been killed in this country and the total figure is 244. In 2020, there were 38 murders and six of those, some 15.8%, were of women - innocent women. While all murders are wrong, whether drug-related or not, it is terrible to think that six innocent women died like that in 2020. I did some research in regard to the world situation. Another figure from 2020 is that 47,000 women were killed by intimate partners or family members in 2020, which averages 137 a day. The point I want to stress is that 80% of those killings were carried out by men or teenage boys, and that is not to take into account other areas of murder, but the figure is 47,000 women, or 137 every day in the world. There is a huge problem in Ireland and across the world.

We have another problem with some of the media coverage. There is something that has sickened me in the last ten years. Prior to Christmas, we have the build-up in regard to the soaps, which I know are hugely popular. What is the big point? It is that there is going to be a mysterious killing or a disappearance of a woman. Some people might say that it should be highlighted in a soap but I do not. That is not the reason it is being highlighted. It is being highlighted to up the ratings on the television shows - that is why it is being done. I will back that up. In the two or three weeks prior to that soap being shown over the Christmas period, many media outlets take on an actor or a writer from those soaps, building this up, hyping it up in the media. That should not be allowed.

I have a letter with me from a young lady I know. Anybody can see the letter because I think we need to show the validity of what we have. As I said, I know this lady.She wrote:

I’m sure Minister McEntee has great intentions [in relation to tackling this issue] and protecting women but I’m curious to know what her male colleagues are doing to ensure an end to this war on women? After all this is not just a female issue.

As stated in my previous email I stand strongly on the stance that it is downright disgraceful that women carrying self defense pepper spray or a tazor can receive the same sentence as someone carrying a gun. This is a 5 year sentence [or up to five years]. Our options are break the law and risk a 5 year sentence but stand a chance of survival if attacked or face an attack with nothing to defend ourselves and at this stage we all know the likely outcome of that. Tell me do you think this fair? Do you think this is safe?

I am not condoning violence, but that lady makes a very strong point.

In conclusion, I extend my deepest sympathies to the Murphy family - father, mother, sister and brother - and Ashling's boyfriend, Ryan Casey, whose life has been absolutely destroyed. His grandparents were giving them a site to build a house. I understand they had a wonderful relationship for up to five years. What happened is just horrendous and terrible. Like most men, I promise that we recognise we have a huge role to play here and we will do it.