Government ignores recommendations to address violence against women

In 1997 the government published a task-force report on violence against women, which looked primarily at domestic violence. Nine years later, most of the report's recommendations have not been implemented. By Emma Browne

In the nine years since the Report of the Task Force on Violence Against Women was published, the majority of its recommendations have not been implemented.
Some of the major recommendations not implemented included a 24-hour national helpline for domestic-violence victims; a national awareness campaign; compilation of statistics on domestic-violence victims; training for frontline staff; and counselling for victims at all refuges. Only 11 of the 28 recommendations have been implemented.

The most important recommendation related to Women's Aid, who run a confidential helpline for victims of domestic violence. The report recommended the helpline operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week and that it have a computerised bed-bureau to locate beds for callers if needed. The helpline was to be advertised nationwide. Nine years later, the Women's Aid helpline has no bed-bureau and over the years it has received little funding for advertising.

The helpline cannot be run on a 24/7 basis because Women's Aid lacks funding and struggles to handle the calls it receives. Last year it could not answer 40 per cent of calls – around 10,504 – due to a lack of resources. For the past two years Women's Aid has asked the government for an extra €70,000 a year for the helpline but has received nothing.

Also central to the task-force report was the establishment of a national steering committee (NSC) on domestic violence to oversee policy in the area. An NSC on violence against women was set up in 1997, but it is not clear what work it has carried out. There is no detail of its work on the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform website and it has published just two reports in nine years.

The committee was also charged with running a national awareness campaign, to include TV/radio and poster campaigns. The first poster campaign didn't happen until 2003 and it was eight years before a TV campaign took place – it lasted for three weeks.

A recommendation that all frontline staff at the refuges be trained to deal with domestic violence has not been addressed either. According to Sharon O'Halloran from the National Network of Women's Refuges, training of staff “hasn't improved at all and no resources are being put into it”. One of the problems is that there is no accredited course for domestic-violence training.

Another important recommendation was the establishment of one-stop centres in each local area which could provide information on all the services available to victims of domestic violence. This has not been done.

Counselling was also to be available at all refuges. This was a priority recommendation. According to Sharon O'Halloran, “Very limited money is put into this area – it is a major flaw and weakness in the system.” The HSE was unable to provide any figures on what refuges they provide with counselling funding.

None of the monitoring recommendations made in the report have been established. It recommended that the Garda publish and gather more detailed statistics, that the domestic-violence act be monitored, that more thorough records be kept at refuges and that the health and social services maintain better records. None of these recommendations have been carried out.

Even though all the recommendations in relation to more Garda training and a domestic-violence unit were implemented, Women's Aid said two thirds of their callers are unhappy with the way gardaí dealt with them.

One of the problems with the area of domestic violence is that it falls between three government departments – Health and Children, Environment and Local Government, and Justice, Equality and Law Reform. The HSE is also involved and provides a lot of the funding in the area.

Village sent questions relating to the task-force recommendations to the HSE in June. It took nearly six months to get an answer. Even then, the HSE was unable to provide information on a range of areas it oversees or on how much money it spends on domestic-violence services every year, as it hasn't compiled central national statistics.

Improvements have been made (see panel) but a shortage of refuge bed-spaces remains the major problem. According the figures released in the Dáil, 1,104 female victims of domestic violence were turned away from the HSE eastern-region accommodation centres in 2005 due to lack of space. But the HSE cannot provide any information on how many women have been turned away from their refuges nationally.