The Covid-19 pandemic has had an “unprecedented and exhausting impact” on victims of domestic abuse, Women’s Aid has said.

It has launched its Annual Impact Report 2020, which shows that the number of contacts to Women’s Aid services jumped by 43% last year.

According to the report, 29,717 contacts were made with the organisation’s frontline services in 2020, compared to just over 20,000 contacts in 2019.

Frontline services include a 24-hour national helpline, which recorded 26,400 contacts last year.

During these contacts, 30,841 disclosures of abuse were made – 24,893 against women and 5,948 against children. Different types of abuse against women were reported, including physical, sexual and emotional abuse, and each of these types of abuse saw an increase in contacts since 2019.

For example, there was a 36% increase in disclosures of emotional abuse, from 12,742 in 2019 to 17,321 in 2020, and a 41% increase in sexual abuse, from 606 in 2019 to 855 in 2020.

The organisation said that it heard from many women who had experienced a worsening of their abuse during lockdown restrictions. Meanwhile, more older women became service users in 2020 “as the toll of living with an abusive partner for many years became too much when forced to spend all their time at home away from friends, family and any activities”.

The figures were described as “staggering” by Women’s Aid CEO, Sarah Benson. However, she insisted that they are “only the tip of the iceberg”.

“One in four women in Ireland are targeted during their lifetime by current or former partners, and 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 intimate relationships.

“Women disclosed to us that they had been beaten, strangled, burned, raped and had their lives threatened. They told us about being denied access to the family income to feed and clothe themselves and their children, and being stalked and humiliated online,” Ms Benson explained.

She warned that the impact of abuse is wide ranging and long term. Some women had disclosed to Women’s Aid support workers that they had experienced broken bones, nerve damage, constant fear, complete isolation from family and friends, suicidal ideation, job loss, poverty and homelessness.

“Women also disclosed that they had been beaten during their pregnancy and some had lost their baby because of the abuse,” she noted.

The report also highlighted the impact on children, some of whom had witnessed or overheard abuse, while others had been direct victims.

“In 2020, there were 5,948 disclosures of abuse of children made to Women’s Aid, including children being beaten with weapons, sexual abuse, constant and degrading verbal abuse, being hurt when the abuser was trying to attack their mother and abuse or neglect during access visits,” Ms Benson said.

Meanwhile, the organisation warned that abuse often continues even after an abusive relationship has ended because the family law system fails to adequately protect women and children when it comes to custody and access arrangements.

“The process is prolonged, costly and disempowering. It often results in unsafe custody and access arrangements, which disregard the impact of domestic abuse on children and overlook the risk of their direct abuse and/or exposure to domestic violence. The safety of the protective parent, usually the mother, is rarely, if ever, considered in custody and access hearings,” Ms Benson explained.

She insisted that the current system lets down abused women and children.

“There is a silencing of women who have been abused. The voice of the child is not heard and vindicated as it should be. There is a pro-contact culture that does not consider risk to both the non-abusing parent or the child, and which benefits domestic abuse perpetrators.

“Evidence of criminal proceedings against abusers, domestic violence orders and other risks are often ignored in custody and access hearings as irrelevant when they should be front and centre in considering safe contact for children and the protective parent. This is dangerous and must be corrected,” Ms Benson said.

She pointed out that the court can become a “tool” for the abuser, “who will relentlessly drag women and children back for even minor grievances as a pretext to continue to control and torment their former partners”.

She said that the system should act “to help break the coercive bond that is controlling women and children”.

Women’s Aid is calling for reform of the family law system, adding that this urgently needs to be done ahead of “an expected tsunami of cases that were delayed due to Covid-19 restrictions”.

The Annual Impact Report 2020 can be viewed here.