Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin North Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chairman for allowing me time to make a few brief remarks, and I thank the witnesses for their presentation. To consider international comparators with regard to the area-based approach, I am most familiar with West Dunbartonshire in Glasgow, where, as opposed to waiting for the national government to churn out a policy eventually, local solutions were found when an individualised problem with literacy levels among children was identified. We may need a value shift in national policy. Other jurisdictions use different language and speak about moving towards the total eradication of illiteracy, whereas we speak about tackling educational disadvantage. Do we need to be more ambitious and use terminology that depicts child poverty as a disease which must be eradicated? Are we too comfortable with where we are?

What the witnesses are dealing with is a crisis of underachievement, disconnection, disempowerment and poverty. Unfortunately, when one digs deep into preventative approaches in projects involving children, there can be a great deal of fluff. Mr. Candon and I worked quite closely together in Sheriff Street for many years and had the misfortune to deal closely with the Dublin Docklands Development Authority. We learned quickly the value of taking a photograph of an impoverished-looking child while sitting behind a laptop; if one takes a photograph it looks like one is doing something. It is more difficult to have a long-term strategy that can dig deep to empower the child and his or her family to find a way out of this poverty. An evidence-based approach is needed. We have spoken previously about the Hart-Risley report and the differential between the oral language skills of a three-year-old in a professional family versus those of a three-year-old in a welfare family. We have spoken about maternal depression and isolation and the huge crisis this represents in certain areas of the country. One project, which I will not name, dealt with the percentage of infant children who decided their own bedtimes. These crucial areas have not made it into mainstream discussions on what has an impact on children.

Deputy Conway made a very good point that we cannot depend on the goodwill of an inspirational person. Many communities depend on such goodwill, but the State must step up to the mark. The State has been allowed off the hook by those who are willing to go the extra mile in their communities, but this is not good enough any more. Far too many services know the boundaries of their responsibilities and are very keen to stress them. These include the HSE, education services and housing authorities dealing with estate management in various communities. None of these agencies seems to have a mechanism for speaking to any other. I am taken with Mr. Candon's suggestion of an overall tsar who might be able to knock heads together and start delivering benefits for children. Parental empowerment is key.

How would this be mapped over a prolonged period of time? Early intervention strategies can show great results in the fifth or sixth year of a child's life. How is this maintained over a long time when a child begins to plateau at the age of ten in primary school and cannot move to the next level of literacy that is needed to tackle secondary education? Do we need a 20 or 30-year strategy to tackle child poverty? Is there something the political system can do collectively? Party politics is one thing, but child poverty is far too important for us to play politics with, and it should not change every five years with a change of government. Do we need a plan we can all buy into for eradicating child poverty? I would be interested to hear the views of the witnesses on this.