Minister's absence from meeting criticised

The Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs was criticised yesterday for his absence from a conference in Dublin on male victims of domestic abuse, organised by the AMEN group.

The chairman, journalist John Waters, said Mr Ahern had declined to deliver a policy statement to the conference at UCD. "If the conference was organised by a women's group, would we have been ignored?" he asked.

Women generally tended to be more sympathetic where the issue was concerned, he said. "Men get nervy and shifty" when the subject came up and if they addressed it at all in the Dail, it was only after "genuflecting three times before women deputies and assuring them they were not trying to roll back the revolution".

He said the issue of male victims of domestic abuse also involved the "multi-million pound [caring] industry", which attempted to sever children from their families and at the same time ignored the cries and endurance of men who were abused. Ms Mary Cleary, who founded AMEN last December, said its helpline had received more than 3,000 calls. Meetings took place in Dublin, Cork, Waterford and Monaghan. She criticised Minister of State Ms Mary Wallace for saying in the Dail recently that men were responsible for 95 per cent of domestic violence cases. The conference was also addressed by TDs Ms Roisin Shortall, Labour, and Mr Jim Higgins, Fine Gael, and by men who told of violence inflicted on them by former wives or girlfriends.

The AMEN helpline and fax number is 046-23718. Its email address is amen@iol.ie.