Pauline O'Reilly (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister. I came back from Brussels this morning. I was there yesterday to help launch an atlas on contraception for Europe. Ireland has jumped significantly, by 15%, to make it into the top four. This has happened quickly because of small measures but, in some ways, it has taken quite a while to get here because the likes of the Irish Family Planning Association has been advocating for this for some time. It does go to show what a Government can do when it puts its mind to making lives better.

I mean this with all due respect to my male colleagues who are present. Yesterday, one of the questions asked was why so few men were in the room. There were quite a lot of men in the room compared to the rooms I am usually in when I talk about gender equality issues. It is every bit as hard for a woman to stand up here, over and over again, and talk about violence against women and violence against their daughters, mothers, sisters, friends. I accept that is hard for men to stand up and speak, but we want them to stand up and speak. We want them to take action. We are asking them to come into the Chamber - every chamber and every pub and club - to speak. I assure them that we want them to be partners in this endeavour.I am speaking in difficult circumstances because over the last year one woman has died from violence every week. I just wonder what we are doing. It is great news that there is a real commitment to ensuring there are refuges in every county. In the north west, however, we have a particularly poor provision of refuges. I note that a few of those counties, including Leitrim, Longford, Monaghan, Roscommon and Sligo, are in my own area. I know others have been mentioned in other areas.

Women's Aid has estimated that it does not have refuge space available for two out of three of its callers. Some end up returning to unsafe homes, but the reality is that many just never leave home. In 2020, Saoirse Domestic Violence Services found that it was unable to provide refuge accommodation for 78% of the requests that it received, amounting to 369 individuals it was unable to assist. In my county, it is no wonder that it is difficult to deal with the problem given the scale of it. It is a cultural issue but it also has to be dealt with through the provision of refuge spaces. There were 2,000 calls reporting domestic abuse in Galway last year. In addition, the number of domestic disputes dramatically increased to 384. Even when there are refuges and highly dedicated gardaí available, it is still incredibly difficult. There are just not enough spaces available. We need to take a prosecution-first approach and there must be zero tolerance. I have my doubts as to whether everybody in An Garda Síochána is aware that this is the approach we need to take. I know the Minister is committed to doing that and ensuring that word gets out.

In Galway we are also very lucky that we have the Barnahus service, which I visited last year with the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth. The Government and the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, in particular, are committed to ensuring that children who are victims of sexual abuse and assault have the very best circumstances in which to deliver impact statements and witness testimony. Barnahus is second to none in that regard. When I visited the facility, the lack of link-up between Garda services across the region and referral to Barnahus was highlighted to me. I would like the Minister to follow up on that.

As many previous speakers have said, prevention is key. There is a history of violence against women and a lack of respect for women in this country. There is also a lack of tolerance when it comes to gender generally. It is true that violence impacts on all genders, and we have to recognise that, but we know from the statistics that the victims are predominantly women. The first time the Minister attended a meeting of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Education, Further Education, Research Innovation and Science, which I sit on, I spoke about consent. That was in 2020.

I note the Minister's comments on relationship and sexuality education. We are still in a situation where 90% of our schools are Catholic. I know that many of those schools are absolutely committed to providing the very best age-appropriate information on consent, sexuality and relationships. It is time to move on with the process of ensuring that from the very youngest age, people understand and learn about respect. What engagement has there been with the Minister for Education on progressing that?

Women's safety audits are an important part of the conversation. On transport and on our streets, we need to make sure that women can go everywhere men can go and that they are not given advice to wear a pair of runners when they go out so they can run away fast. We have all been told that and it has been reiterated to us as politicians.

I spoke to the Minister last week about the family courts. I recognise that the Government has made huge strides, in particular with the introduction of domestic violence leave by the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth. We were one of the first countries in Europe to bring that in. There is good work happening as well.