The number of rapes reported to the Garda so far this year indicates that they have reached the level of one a day, according to the Minister of State for Justice and Equality, Ms Mary Wallace.
Ms Wallace was addressing the Oireachtas Committee on Women's Rights on the first report of the National Steering Committee on Violence against Women, which was published in March.
She said reported crimes of violence against women were increasing steeply. There were 256 recorded in 1997, which was up 40 per cent on the previous year. In 1998 this rose again to 292, and was now running at the rate of almost one a day. However, the rate of increase in reporting these crimes had slowed, as some of these were rapes that had occurred in the past and were only now being reported, perhaps due to a more favourable environment. Ms Olive Braiden of the Rape Crisis Centre said only a third of rapes were reported to gardai, with "an average of 55 recent rapes reported to us a month, and this is only for the Dublin area". She expected a 30 per cent increase in calls this year.
She believed the main reason for not reporting rape was because the criminal and legal process was so difficult.
The Minister stressed that as demand increased, support services must be increased - outreach services were important. The steering committee was looking for of a single national, referral help-line, to put people in contact with the appropriate local service, "but the services have to be there", she said.
Ms Braiden told the committee that funding for voluntary organisations like hers was an enormous problem. Professional staff were very much in demand in the private sector, which could afford to pay much better.
The recent States of Fear programme had generated a lot of calls. A lot of damage could be done when people were counselled by untrained counsellors, she said.
Ms Jan O'Sullivan, the Labour spokeswoman on justice and law reform, suggested that a way around the constitutional difficulties on having separate legal representation for rape victims might be to have one person from the State's legal team, not necessarily a barrister, liaising with them and keeping them informed.
Ms Mary Hanafin TD (Fianna Fail), asked if research was being done to profile the victims, their ages and circumstances; she suggested examining the role of alcohol.
Mr Jim Higgins, the Fine Gael spokesman on justice and law reform, said the recent charges for the murder of Phyllis Murphy showed the need for the introduction of a national DNA database.