Women's Aid and domestic violence
Deputy Cairns highlighted the scale of domestic abuse in the Women’s Aid report and welcomed work on the zero-tolerance strategy. The Taoiseach agreed the issue was serious, praised her remarks, and said he would share further measures to expand supports.
At the outset, I wish the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, the very best as he announced he is stepping down as leader of the Green Party. He has always been sincere and helpful. He can be proud of his contribution to Irish public life.
Domestic violence is a problem which is endemic, systemic and growing. Women's Aid recorded more than 40,000 disclosures of abuse last year. These figures are truly shocking. That is a 20% increase on the previous year. I acknowledge that the Minister, Deputy McEntee, is working on this issue and that tackling it is not easy. What goes on behind closed doors is difficult to police. That is why it is so important that women feel safe in coming forward. It is why we have to ensure that women feel they have options other than remaining in an abusive relationship. Too many women do not feel that way. We know we have a chronic shortage of women's refuge spaces. There has been almost no progress on that. We have just one third of the recommended number of refuge spaces. There are nine counties which do not have any spaces at all. Where is the urgency? What new measures will the Government introduce to tackle this issue? What progress can we expect to see this year?
Comment on this
I thank Deputy Cairns for her kind words for the Minister, Deputy Ryan, and congratulate her on her own good news. I know everyone in this House is genuinely delighted for her and for Barry and we wish them all the very best. It is nice to have good news in this place too.
I thank her for raising the very important issue relating to the Women’s Aid report and the work relating to the zero-tolerance strategy. She asked specifically about new measures. The honest answer to that, in addition to the list I can provide her on how we will get to the significant increase in places that has been promised under the strategy and the work that is under way in Wexford, Dundalk and Navan and the 17 new safe homes last year and the 13 more this year, the new approach is that there is now a statutory agency, Cuan, and it has been asked to produce a monitoring plan every quarter to show the delivery of those projects. It has also been asked to look at new ways to accelerate the delivery because I accept this is urgent and so too does the Minister, Deputy McEntee. I hope that having our new statutory agency with a co-ordinating role will help.