Keith Walsh SC

Women’s Aid said its national and regional frontline services were contacted 32,144 times in 2024, an increase of 12 per cent on the previous year and the highest contact rates in the organisation’s 50-year history.

Its frontline teams heard a total of 46,765 disclosures of incidents of domestic violence and abuse in 2024, including 41,432 against women and 5,333 against children — an overall increase of 17 per cent from 2023.

Keith Walsh SC, partner at Dublin firm Keith Walsh Solicitors, told Irish Legal News: “The 17 per cent increase in domestic violence disclosures to Women’s Aid unfortunately reflect the ongoing increases in court applications under the Domestic Violence Act 2018.

“There were 14,374 court applications in 2015 and the latest figures available for 2023 show there were 25,563 court applications that year, an increase of 8.6 per cent on the previous year and a 56 per cent increase over 10 years, which is shocking.

“Domestic violence applications make up over 60 per cent of all private family law cases in the District Court.”

He added: “Currently applications for domestic violence cases are being made in unsuitable court buildings around Dublin as we await the start of the construction of the new family justice courts in Hammond Lane.

“The increase in domestic violence and other family law cases is causing further pressure on the entire system and more resources are required to deal humanely with families and children who are forced to use this system.”

Mr Walsh also suggested the Domestic Violence Act 2018 should be reviewed “to see what changes could be introduced such as defining domestic violence behaviours and making them subject to the criminal law rather than the civil law”.

“It is clear now, as it has been for some time that the home is not a safe place and the state needs to intervene further and more effectively to protect its citizens,” he said.

Sarah Benson, chief executive officer of Women’s Aid, said today: “The number and nature of the disclosures of abuse to our frontline services is utterly appalling. However, this is just the tip of the iceberg.

“Thirty-five per cent of women in Ireland — one in three — suffer physical, psychological or sexual abuse from an intimate partner. Additionally, there are so many children, families and whole communities also impacted.

“Fear, stigma, and the debilitating impact of the abuse itself — but also persisting social attitudes to domestic violence — prevent victims from coming forward.

“So many victim-survivors lack the information or confidence to contact specialist services, and about one third will suffer in total isolation, telling nobody what is happening to them.

“We still have so much work to do to break this silence to encourage those in need to get the support they deserve.

“What we hear in our national and regional services is replicated across Ireland in local domestic abuse refuges and organisations.”