Niall Ó Donnghaile (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Ar dtús cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire agus fáiltím roimh an deis cúpla focal a rá ar na ráitis thar a bheith tábhachtach seo. The Minister is very welcome to the House. Last week, I attended a rally outside the gates of a Leinster House. It coincided with Lá na Féile Bríde and it was in support of the family of Natalie McNally, who was murdered in her home in Lurgan. Ms McNally was the 16th woman to be killed in Ireland last year as a result of domestic violence. She was 32 years old when she was murdered, and she was 15 weeks pregnant. I had the privilege of meeting some of Natalie's family after the rally. I am very conscious that someone is before the courts in relation to the case. Much like the many other families of the women victims across our society, our thoughts are with them in their pursuit of justice. At the rally, women's rights activist Ailbhe Smyth described men's violence against women and children as an ongoing emergency. The rally also heard calls for men to join women. We have heard it again today in the campaign to change our attitudes.

I received a link from Women's Aid to the Femicide Watch campaign, which indicated that every day, 137 women across the world are killed by a partner or member of their own family. Femicide is broadly understood as the killing of women and girls by men. The term is used to describe the killing of women and girls precisely because they are women and girls. It is important that society recognises that women and girls are being killed because of their gender. Femicide in this State has resulted in over 244 women dying violently since 1996, 18 children dying alongside their mothers and 152 women being killed in their own homes. In 87% of the cases that have been resolved, the women were killed by a man known to them and 13% were killed by stranger. One in two femicide victims is killed by a current or former male partner and 191 cases have been resolved. Women of any age can be victims of femicide, but women under the age of 35 make up 50% of the cases in this State. In almost all murder-suicide cases, 22 out of 23, the killer was the woman's partner. Is it any wonder that Ailbhe Smyth described male violence against women as an ongoing emergency?

Research has shown that this ongoing emergency is located in the outlook and the society that men inhabit. Domestic abuse and violence against women are underpinned by a culture of misogyny. Violence against women exists on a conveyer belt of sexist jokes, so-called banter and catcalling at one end, and rape and murder at the other. While this ongoing emergency does not involve all men, there are things that all men can do and, indeed, must do. What all men can do is to educate themselves and challenge misogyny wherever it rears its head. In the context of these violent statistics, it is almost beyond belief that research also shows that most violence, abuse, coercive control and harassment of women goes unreported.

We cannot commend enough the organisations that are working tirelessly on behalf of all women and society, including Safe Ireland, Women's Aid, rape crisis centres and the Rape Crisis Network of Ireland and local domestic violence refuges. We commend the provision of supports and services in protecting women and their children and the efforts all of them and indeed others put into shaping public policy. However, these organisations need the full support of the Government and all Departments. Last year, the Government published its third State strategy on domestic, sexual and gender-based violence. Despite the important and welcome recommendations in the report, the Government has failed to implement it. There is no justification for this unnecessary delay. The Government is allowing a long-awaited report to gather dust on a shelf while women and children are dying and others are experiencing violence and abuse of the most extreme kind as we speak. How can the Government stand over this appalling state of affairs? Last year, the then Minister for Justice described a zero-tolerance approach to harassment and violence, but all that we have had from the Government since then is zero movement on the worthy objective of zero tolerance.

The Government needs to prioritise the implementation of the recommendations from the independent study on familicide and domestic homicide reviews, DHRs. DHRs are an important mechanism by which State agencies and services protect victims. We urgently need better data on sexual, violent and gender-based crimes in this State. A dedicated State-wide database would be of immense help. I hope that will ultimately be an all-Ireland database. These objectives can be achieved, but they need a Government that has the resolve to implement the recommendations of a report it has authorised. I know the Minister will lead in that regard.I am also conscious of the increased levels of hostility, threat, violence, rhetoric, dog-whistling, misinformation and fearmongering against trans women. The Government should consider keeping all women safe from abuse, violence and harm within its strategies.

For too long misogyny and violence against women have been a shameful part of Irish life. For too long women have been the victims and survivors and for too long they have had to endure. These issues did not materialise and have not materialised with the arrival of people from other places. For too long it has been a shameful Irish problem in Ireland and it must be tackled and ended by all of us working to end it together. Women, no matter who they are, must be protected and men who are responsible for violence against women in whatever forms, no matter who they are, must be pursued and brought to justice.