Ms Emily Logan:

I am very familiar with the Foróige project to which Deputy Naughten referred. It is probably not appropriate for me, as Ombudsman for Children, to support one project over another because I get many letters. However, I acknowledge that Foróige does wonderful work. I would be very supportive of Deputies Naughten and Dowds in their advocacy of preventative measures, which are very important. It is important that we do not end up putting all our resources into the wrong end of the spectrum. Although we are talking about Oberstown today, the profile of children is as Deputy Dowds said. It is the same group of children coming from the same estates and our orientation should be much more towards preventative measures at an early stage. I do not have the answers to some of the societal challenges put forward but I have been out and about in communities and have seen some wonderful programmes from the voluntary sector, whether from Barnardos or otherwise, and people working in communities in those very estates about which Deputy Dowds talked.

We need to be careful and to have a long-term vision of what we want and not just have the short-term measure of fixing Oberstown. That is why I speak beyond capital projects and talk about cultures because in the long term we need to be very careful and to give very considered responses to some of the preventative interventions we could undertake. We see that quite a lot in our office, specifically in regard to child protection where a family might have been struggling for many years and where there was very little action or support but when there was a crisis, there was quite a lot of State intervention. I would be much more supportive of earlier intervention, as I am sure would many members of the committee. It is something to which many people have referred.

In regard to the issue of health and education working together, I would very much like to see inter-agency co-operation at a much earlier stage. I know there have been very encouraging comments in regard to early education because that is when one picks things up. If one invests in early education, many of the social problems about which we talk can be picked up much earlier than when children become teenagers and get involved in crime.