Call for greater support for survivors of sexual violence who face ‘compounded barriers’ to disclosure

RAPE CRISIS IRELAND has warned that a “significant number” of survivors of rape and sexual violence face “compounded barriers” to disclosure, reporting, and accessing support.

Rape Crisis Ireland (RCI) is today launching its 2025 report and said it highlights the “compounded barriers” experienced by survivors with characteristics associated with greater vulnerability.

“Compounded barriers” is a term that recognises that different characteristics can “compound the barriers” survivors face in being targeted in accessing support and in finding safety.

Compounded barriers include sexual orientation, gender identity, ethnicity, legal status in Ireland (including European citizens) and disability.

RCI’s latest statistics show that 32% of survivors accessing support from one of its centres last year had one or more characteristics associated with compounding barriers.

Some 14% had two or more compounding barriers.

Only 14% of survivors facing two or more compounded barriers reported to a formal authority – less than half the rate of the overall survivor population (33%).

RCI also found that the presence of multiple perpetrators was more commonly recorded among survivors facing compounded barriers to safety or service.

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RCI said this “pattern suggests that those already facing greater disadvantage may be at heightened risk of group-perpetrated abuse”.

The RCI has called on the government “ensure an equal right to support and justice for survivors who face compounded barriers”.

Clíona Saidléar, the executive director of RCI, said the data “deepens our understanding of the experiences of survivors who face compounded barriers”.

“LGBTQIA+ survivors, people with disabilities, and people from migrant and minority communities are among those whose experiences are too often rendered invisible,” said Saidléar.

She added that RCI’s recommendations this year “place particular emphasis on prevention and ensuring that services are culturally responsive, inclusive, and adequately resourced to reach every survivor, no matter their background or identity”.

Saidléar added: “Survivors tell us, again and again, that the barriers they face don’t end with the violence itself: they continue in trying to be believed, kept safe, and supported afterwards.

“For survivors with a disability, especially those facing discrimination or needing additional support and especially those living in residential care, even raising a concern can depend entirely on someone else asking, noticing, or believing them, since self-referral simply isn’t realistic in those settings.”

Saidléar has called for a “whole-of-system protocol that brings what is currently largely hidden to the surface”.

She said this protocol will deliver “accessible routes for disclosure into every residential setting, and connects every safeguarding response, no matter where it starts, directly into specialist trauma support”.

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