Women’s Aid - Society must invest now to help victims

More than 24,000 victims called the Women’s Aid helplines last year, but less than half of them got an answer because the organisation lacked the funds to have the telephone lines properly attended.

Listening to cries for assistance is a trying and difficult job. The stories of the callers seeking help are as harrowing as they are diversified.

Almost half of those who telephoned the service were calling for the first time.

Callers related a horrifying catalogue of abuses, some amounting to torture.

Any society that tolerates such conduct should question its right to call itself civilised.

Many of the callers were pregnant, and Women’s Aid said the abuse resulted in stillbirths, miscarriages, or injuries to the unborn child. In 4,800 of the calls a child was being abused or children were affected by the violence in the home.

More than half of the calls are being ignored, because society is not even investing enough for people to listen. Minister of State for Children Brendan Smith accepts that not enough is being done to protect children growing up in violent homes.

This amounts to incubating problems for society in the future. Children in such circumstances inevitably become disturbed, and they will likely become problem adults before very long.

It would be much cheaper and much more effective to face these problems now.