Surge in calls sparks bid for new site for refuge

A refuge in Athlone for victims of domestic violence is beginning the process of acquiring a new premises amid an unprecedented rise in demand for its services.

Esker House women’s refuge and domestic abuse support service has recorded a 15% increase in helpline calls for January compared to the same period last year, which has prompted them to begin preparing plans for the establishment of a purpose-built premises on a greenfield site in the Athlone area, according to its manager, Deirdre Berry.

“Our biggest challenge is the unmet needs of refuge requests, and the fact remains that we do not have enough refuge spaces to meet the huge demand,” says Ms Berry. “We are in the same building since the refuge was established and we are the only refuge service across the entire Midlands area.”

The management team at Esker House is currently undertaking a feasibility study on the need for a new refuge centre, and is preparing a strategic plan to be presented to Westmeath County Council later this year. “We will also have to put a funding plan in place,” points out Deirdre Berry, “but there is clearly a very urgent need for more spaces for women and children who are experiencing domestic abuse in the Midlands.”

An overview of the services provided by Esker House in 2020, which is the last year for which figures are available, shows they responded to 482 crisis calls on their helpline and received an unprecedented 229 requests for emergency refuge accommodation. During the same period they were only in a position to provide refuge accommodate to 21 women and 27 children.

“We provided 1,856 support sessions to women who were in domestic abuse situations in 2020,” says Deirdre Berry.

“But not only has the volume of calls been increasing all the time, but the complexities of the cases we are dealing with is also increasing and evolving all the time.”

Frontline workers dealing with the victims of domestic violence in Esker House managed to maintain “all services” during the pandemic, but Berry says the past two years have had presented “huge challenges” for domestic violence victims in moving from refuge to rental accommodation.

“We are struggling to move women and children on from refuge with the rental market having been impacted negatively by Covid,” she points out, “and single women with no children find this particularly challenging.”

Ms Berry said the recent horrifying murder of Ashling Murphy has “awoken many to the harsh reality of gender-based violence” and Esker House has experienced “a noticeable increase in calls and offers of support” since the young Offaly schoolteacher was attacked while out jogging along the banks of the Grand Canal in Tullamore in broad daylight on January 12 last.

“People are having discussions now which extend beyond the shock and grief of Ashling’s murder and are asking ‘how did we get here as a society? And I think that conversation needs to include the fact that one in every four women in Ireland experiences domestic abuse… it is common and it is happening in homes everywhere,” says Deirdre Berry.

Esker House currently has three units for women and children on site in Athlone and has acquired a fourth unit off-site, but Deirdre Berry acknowledges there is an urgent need for a “purpose-built, future-proof refuge and support service to serve the entire Midlands area” and she would like to see it being built on a greenfield site.

Meanwhile, Longford/Westmeath Sinn Féin deputy Sorcha Clarke has called on the government to correct the “historic under-investment” in domestic, sexual and gender-based violence services, and said “genuine political action” needs to be taken to improve outcomes for survivors and victims.

Deputy Clarke pointed out that capacity at women’s refuges “has actually decreased since 2015” which she described as “shameful.”

In response to a recent Parliamentary Question on the issue, Tusla confirmed that, although budgetary allocations have increased over the past five years, capacity at women’s refuge centres has not kept pace.

“While 142 refuge spaces were available in 2015, that number has, in fact, dropped to 137 in 2021,” said Deputy Clarke, who pointed out that domestic violence “has exacerbated over the pandemic” and there are still “several counties” with no refuge services.

Deirdre Berry says Esker House has received “amazing support and solidarity” from the local community in the greater Athlone area, particularly since the murder of Ashling Murphy, and she pledged that the offers of support “will not go unanswered” and that they will help to “drive real change in our towns and communities.”