Information Webinar: Domestic Abuse in Ireland

Tackling Domestic Abuse in Ireland – We All Have a Part to Play

With the high number of women working within our industry and with the volume of women clients who we meet on a daily basis, HABIC believes that it is our collective responsibility to be aware of the signs of domestic abuse. We also feel that it is important that as we work within the personal care sector, we should be informed on how to respond to these signs and signals. To this end, HABIC has teamed up with Women’s Aid to bring you a webinar that focuses on ‘Tackling Domestic Abuse in Ireland’, next Monday 18th Oct, at 11am.

If we think about it, we all know someone who has been affected by domestic violence.  It could be our sister, our friend, our workmate, our client or our mother. Or perhaps we have had our own personal experience.  As a leading national domestic violence organisation, Women’s Aid supports women from all walks of life and of all ages, right across the country. 

With one in four women in Ireland subjected to domestic abuse including coercive control, hair and beauty businesses in local communities across Ireland can play a crucial role in raising awareness among those who may need support,

writes Sarah Benson, CEO of Women’s Aid.

Last year, 29,717 contacts were made with Women’s Aid’s frontline services, during which 24,893 disclosures of domestic abuse against women including coercive control were made.  Support workers also heard 5,948 disclosures of abuse against children.  The reality is that thousands of women are being subjected to high levels of emotional, physical, sexual and economic abuse every day, at the hands of the person who is supposed to care for and respect them.  The COVID-19 pandemic made the crisis level of domestic violence in Ireland more visible and has highlighted more than ever the fact that we all have a part to play in supporting those affected. Preventing and combating domestic abuse needs a whole community response.  

These statistics are shocking and represent a 43% increase in the numbers of women reaching out to Women’s Aid for support during the most difficult of years.  However, these figures are only the tip of the iceberg as the numbers of people who are suffering at the hands of those closest to them are many, many times higher. One in four women in Ireland are targeted during their lifetime by current or former partners, a shocking one in five will have been abused by the time they are just 25 years old – many for the first time as teenagers in their earliest and formational intimate relationships.

Abuse is Not Always Physical – Understanding Coercive Control

Domestic violence can be physical, emotional, sexual or economic abuse.  The vast majority of domestic violence and domestic abuse relationships occur in the context of coercive control, which has been a criminal offence in Ireland since 2019. 

Coercive control is an insidious and dangerous form of abuse.  It is a persistent pattern of controlling, coercive and threatening behaviour including all or some forms of domestic abuse (emotional, physical, economic, and/or sexual abuse, including threats) by a partner or ex. It isolates and traps women in a relationship and makes it impossible or dangerous to leave.

Read more: Download the Women’s Aid Leaflet on Coercive Control (https://www.womensaid.ie/assets/files/pdf/coercive_control_leaflet_2021.pdf)

This can have a serious impact including the fear of violence, cause serious alarm and distress and can result in a woman giving up work, changing her routines, losing contact with family and friends and finding her world completely shrunk and diminished. Coercive control can seriously damage a woman’s physical and emotional well-being. Women tell us that when it has become acute, coercive control feels like their abuser is controlling them even from inside their own head. When he has been so overbearing that she hears his voice, instead of her own, in her mind: constantly criticising, berating, questioning and threatening her every move even when they are apart. This can feel completely overwhelming and paralysing.

Learn more about how you can be part of this conversation:

Join HABIC CEO Margaret O’Rourke Doherty in conversation with Sarah Benson, CEO Women’s Aid on Monday 18^th October at 11am exclusively for members of HABIC.  (Click this link to join: https://habic.ie/events/womens-aid-webinar/)

If you have been affected by any issue raised in this article, please contact the Women’s Aid 24hr National Freephone Helpline 1800 341 900 or the instant message support service on www.womensaid.ie (open at fixed times daily).