Senator Gerard Craughwell- speech from 27 Jan 2022

Minister, she only went for a run, Aisleine Murphy and we have all been talking about it ever since her poor body was found and you know all of this hype will pass and Aisleine's mother and father and sister and brother and relations are going to have to live with their grief forever. So it is really sad that it has brought us here to this. I am the brother of eight sisters, the son of a wonderful mother, the husband of a wonderful tolerant wife, the father of a daughter, I have a daughter-in-law, two granddaughters. I cannot believe what I have heard here today. I have never been told by any of my sisters that they have been afraid to walk anywhere. I don't disbelieve what I heard, by the way, don't get me wrong. I am horrified that we have arrived at this place in society where women cannot feel safe walking out, where people feel they have to look over their shoulder to see who's coming behind them. I am actually horrified by it and I am wondering now. It is funny, I was walking behind somebody down the corridor of this building the other day and I thought I should slow my pace slightly because I was getting too close. And that is wrong. And that is wrong. It is wrong in every sense of the word. But many people have spoken here this afternoon. I have to tell you, the only thing that came out of all of this for me is that I have to reappraise the way I live my life. And the things that I once thought maybe were funny, maybe they are not so bloody funny after all. Maybe the people, particularly the women who stood in company with me down through the years, who heard sexist jokes, maybe they weren't really laughing. Maybe they just felt they had to laugh. Maybe they felt intimidated by the company they were in at the time. Maybe they thought they had to be part of the gang. In my time as President of the Teachers Union of Ireland, I was horrified by some of the stories I heard of 13-year-old kids engaged in sexual acts. And I remember one of my colleagues saying to me, particularly where the young girls were concerned, it wasn't that they wanted to engage in the things they were engaged in, it was that they thought they should, because that was the norm. And then I am mindful of the fact of a principal who spoke to me about wanting to introduce a proper sex education programme in his school, a proper programme that would explain consent, would explain what was right and what wasn't right. And he came up against parents. And the parents said, no, no, you're not going to teach that to my kids. And he said, well, I'm quite prepared to sort of try and work with you on this. But at the end of the day, this is something that has to be on the syllabus. This is something that has to be done. And he met with massive, massive opposition to any discussion whatsoever on sex. And this is an issue for all of us in society today. We have to rethink the way we think about these things. I grew up in a society as a young man in Galway, and there was only one sin. We were sent to confessions every Friday and there was only one sin, and that sin was sex. And I don't blame the church for that or anybody else. It was just the way society was at the time. I don't know how I'm going to change my life. I don't know how I'm going to find the courage to say to my male colleagues who send me a joke or tell me something, hey, that's inappropriate. I really don't want that anymore. I don't know how I'm going to do that. And I will look to the women that I know and that I love to maybe put a bit of schmacht on me and change the way I live my life. Because Ashley Murphy's case was terrible. There is no doubt at all about that. But we've heard stories here this afternoon, and we've heard stories ever since Ashley died, about how difficult it is for women to live in this country. And that's something that we have to change. I don't know how we're going to change it. I have great faith in your ability to bring forward legislation. But legislation ain't worth diddly swat if we don't implement it. And that starts from the ground up. But I spent a number of days as a juror in Limerick some years ago. And every day the judge would come in around about 10 or 11 o'clock and he'd tell us the case is adjourned today, come back tomorrow. And the next thing he came in after five or six days and the judge said, right, the case is going ahead today, but we want to thank the members of the jury. They're no longer required. And there was a woman sitting beside me who was a juror as well. She said, what the hell does he mean we're no longer required? We're here for days. And we were told, oh, actually, it's a case of rape. And the perpetrator has pleaded guilty, so there is going to be no trial. He'll be sentenced. And that was it. And she said to me, well, I'm not going home until I see who this fella is. I said, you know what, I'll sit here with you. And the next thing, the defendant was brought into the court. And I swear to you, he was dressed in a white shirt, red tie, navy blue sports jacket, grey trousers, immaculately polished shoes. He looked like somebody that just bought, I don't know what, right? He looked well. He looked as if he was well-to-do. And I looked at him and I waited. And then we found out the story behind the case. 12 o'clock, midday, Limerick City, O'Connell Street. He grabbed a young woman, pulled her into an alleyway and raped her. Midday. Now, please tell me, how could he even think of such a thing at that time of the day? There's a big lesson here for us all. I don't know how we're going to learn it. But look, I could stand up here and say that I've been reformed. I've been horrified and I've got to look into my own self now and see how I can change who I am to be the sort of man that will not accept from my fellow men some of the misogynistic and some of the sexist jokes that I once found funny. And to the women I love, I apologise that I did find them funny. And to the ones who felt they had to laugh in my company with other men who really weren't laughing, I apologise to them. But look, there's nothing we can do to change what has happened today, but we can change what happens going forward. So thank you for your time, Minister.