Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I agree with most of what the Senator has outlined and what she and the groups and representatives she has mentioned are trying to achieve. I have met with many of them. Last week I met with an amazing person who was abused but not by an intimate partner. There was coercive control but because it was not that specific scenario it could not be applied in the courts. This is something I want to move on and change.

The offence of coercive control designed in the Domestic Violence Act is specific to the intimate partner relationship. There had been much engagement with stakeholders and a process to get to that point and make sure it was specific to intimate relationships. I am not saying we need to start from the beginning or that the amendment as set out and the groups working on it have not done a huge amount of that work but we cannot mirror it or put it in as is without the process of ensuring it works in the right way, whether for a person with a disability or in a parent-child relationship, or where abuse takes place that does not include physical violence but includes an emotional and financial element. There is more work we need to do.

I regretfully will not accept the amendment but I want to work with the Senator and others to make sure we can introduce an amendment acknowledging that coercive control happens outside of intimate relationships. Though it is narrow, the introduction of that offence has had a phenomenal impact on how we deal with and think about domestic violence, on the people, in most cases women, who have come forward and on the type of cases we have seen publicly.That has had a positive impact in encouraging victims to come forward. This would probably do the same but we need to give it the same focus and attention and make sure that we get it absolutely right. I will not accepting this, with regret. However, I want to work with the Senator and others to see how we can create a path forward to apply this in other areas.