199 Ms O’Donnell asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the conviction rates for rape in each of the past five years; the number of cases that reached trial for the same period; and his views on a recent report published at the Rape Crisis Network Ireland conference, Sexual Violence Issues and Responses Across Europe, that showed that Ireland has the lowest conviction rate for rape in Europe. [14808/04]

As I previously outlined to the House on 15 October 2003, the conviction rate shown in the report Rape: Still a Forgotten Issue is based on the number of cases reported to the Garda that resulted in a conviction in court. We must also look at cases where sufficient evidence is available to allow a prosecution to take place.

There is a high attrition rate in rape cases here and a large number of cases reported to the Garda do not reach prosecution stage for a variety of reasons. Recently my Department provided funding for further comprehensive research into attrition rates in rape cases. The research is entitled The Understanding of Attrition, Early Withdrawal, the Trial Process and Identifying Possible Changes to Support Complainants in Rape Cases and will be carried out by the Department of Law at the National University of Ireland, Galway and the RCNI. It should give us greater understanding as to why some victims choose not to report cases to the Garda, what can be done about under reporting and why only a relatively small percentage of reported cases result in a court hearing.

The statistics requested are as follows:

*Figures for 2003 are provisional and subject to change.