'Fair City' abuse scenes 'will shock'

Sarah Flood has admitted that she expects viewers to be shocked by upcoming scenes in Fair City.

Flood's Suzanne Halpin will be seen attacking her husband Damien (Maclean Burke) with a snooker cue in a domestic abuse plot.

Speaking to RTÉ Ten, Flood said that she thinks people will find the storyline tough to watch.

"I mean, it's Damien and he is lying on the ground and she is beating him with the snooker cue," she said. "They were very hard scenes to play out and I think they will be quite upsetting to watch."

Flood also confessed that she was surprised by the violent twist and shocked at statistics she uncovered when researching the plot.

"It's certainly not something that is as common, that a wife should be physically abusive towards her husband," she said. "Obviously, it's much more often the other way around. I was horrified to hear that since the recession, there has been a rise in the number of men who have been verbally and physically abused by their wives or partners because of issues with money."

She continued: "It's a subject that a lot of people don't take seriously. Some people don't want to go to the Garda station to say they have been beaten up by their wife or partner and even some doctors don't take it seriously."