- Mayor Paschal Blake and Cllr Gerry Mc Monagle with the Staff and Voluntary Mangement of Letterkenny CDP supporting the White Ribbon Campaign
Letterkenny Sinn Fein Councillor Gerry Mc Monagle has called on the Government to deliver on the Programme for Government commitment to consolidate and reform domestic violence legislation.
The Sinn Fein Councillor said yesterday marked the first of 16 days of action against violence against women.
The Programme for Government commits to delivering consolidated and reformed domestic violence legislation.
“Despite one in five women experiencing domestic violence the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Alan Shatter, has stated on regular occasions that he has more urgent legislative matters to attend to in respect of the troika programme. This is just not good enough when one reads the statistics from last year’s Women’s Aid Annual Report.”
In the Women’s Aid annual report for 2012, there were shocking details of the extent of Domestic Violence visited upon women including, 14,792 incidents of Domestic Violence. Amongst the other statistics released were 9,912 incidents of emotional abuse, 2,859 reports of physical abuse and 1,554 incidents of financial abuse. There were also 467 incidents of sexual abuse including 176 rapes.
“With regards the European Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence the Justice Minister has cited property rights as a difficultly to Ireland signing up, but has not offered any solutions.
“Domestic violence is a very real and increasing problem for women and their children that need’s an urgent response from government, not just in delivering on its legislative commitments but also in ensuring the necessary supports and services are appropriately resourced.”