Criminal Law, Civil Law and Defence (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2026: Report and Final Stages Seanad Éireann — 2026-07-02 ============================================================ Pauline Tully (SF), Cultural and Educational Panel I want to speak in support of amendment No. 26 and any of the amendments that call for an outright ban on the use of counselling notes in cases of sexual violence and rape. If any of us knows a person who has been raped or sexually assaulted, they will know the life-changing and devastating impact it has. They will also know how vital counselling is in the context of trying to address the trauma, process what happened and put a devastated life back together. If these amendments are rejected, this legislation risks deterring survivors seeking counselling and therapy in circumstances where that help is much needed. The relationship between a therapist and a client should be confidential. What they discuss should be confidential. The relationship should be one of trust. It is not produced for the purpose of evidence. It is not a verbatim account. They are clinical records that are disjointed. They show how a person is feeling at one point in time. They can and have been misinterpreted. They have been used to imply inconsistency. They have been misleading and used to undermine a victim or survivor. They have been taken out of context and tried to be used to imply consent. I want to commend the survivors who are sitting with us in the Gallery today. As many have said, the violence is not just the act itself. The court process is so retraumatising, in particular where your notes - your own personal attempts to address what was done to you - are used against you to try to undermine you. It is just completely wrong. It is psychological harm. We have to protect victims and survivors. We have to ensure they are not harmed more than they have already been. The justice committee, which is a cross-party committee, advocated a complete and unconditional ban on the use of counselling notes and the Minister chose to ignore that. We know in cases where they are seldom used by the prosecution, they are used by the defence in an attempt to undermine the victim. I am horrified that this practice was ever permitted but I cannot get past the fact that it may continue as well. We are just retraumatising survivors and it has to stop. If this was the Minister's relative - his daughter, sister or mother - would he want them to have to go through this? If this horrific event happened to them and they sought counselling to try to help to rebuild their lives and address their trauma, they should not have to listen to that in a courtroom. It is personal and private and it should not be used against them. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-07-02/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:09+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-07-02