Sir, – In Denise Charlton's opinion piece "Covid brings home dangers of domestic violence this Christmas" (November 24th), she highlights the need for longer-term strategy, as well as responding to the immediate emergency of domestic abuse.
At Saoirse, we couldn’t agree more with her suggestion of the need for multi-annual funding for sustainable long-term planning for the sector.
Instead, agencies struggle with annual service-level agreements with Government, with no time for both reviewing and planning for what best works for the clients of our services and the overall tackling of this huge problem in our society.
From March to August this year, Saoirse’s Outreach and Prevention Services offered support to 521 families with 974 children. Today Saoirse’s two refuges are full with women and their 17 children who are fleeing abusive relationships.
Saoirse is only one of 39 specialist services around the country that are members of Safe Ireland and getting annual funding which has to be supplemented with fundraising events, many of which had to be cancelled this year because of the Covid-19 pandemic. – Yours, etc,
ELLEN O’MALLEY
DUNLOP,
Acting CEO,
Saoirse,
PO Box 10819,
Tallaght,
Dublin 24 .