Ciara Conway (Waterford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank Dr. Geoffrey Shannon for taking the time to speak to the committee today. More important, I thank him for giving voice to things that have been unspoken for so many years. Some of the issues that he has highlighted are systemic ones on which we can put new tags or names. As Deputy Ó Caoláin said, bullying has been around for a long time and we know that it has a detrimental impact on children’s well-being. Unfortunately, cyberbullying is only another platform for bullies. The issue is the same.

The most salient matter raised by Dr. Shannon is one that never gets enough attention or recognition, alcohol. This is by far the most serious social issue facing Ireland on many fronts, health, family relationships, mental and physical well-being. It costs the Exchequer billions of euro each year, yet our Ministers find it difficult to stand up to sporting organisations on alcohol. This committee produced a very strong report on alcohol and spoke about an outright ban on sponsorship. I concur with Dr. Shannon’s comments because even in media reporting we hear about heroin which is a difficult drug and has major social consequences for communities and families, and we hear about the misuse of hash and crack cocaine but we never really face up to the problem that alcohol poses, particularly for children. I worked as a child protection social worker and the underlying issue in 95% of cases was alcohol abuse. It is used as an excuse for domestic violence and for child abuse, and as an excuse for physical or criminal damage but the issue is the abuse of alcohol and people’s access to it. Unless we really start to face up to that we are at nought because the issues are all the same when it comes to trying to protect our children. If Dr. Shannon analysed child protection cases that come before the courts, as I am sure he has done at some stage in his career, he would find that alcohol is prevalent in the majority of cases. We talk about prevention and support but we do not talk about tackling alcohol. Dr. Shannon is right, it is not just up to this committee or to him, or to the authors of reports, there has to be a whole Government approach to it. We need to decide for once and for all that this is something we have to face up to.

I have a brother training to be a doctor in Galway and we talked about this over the weekend. He has the pleasure of the company of people from many countries in his class so his experience of college is very different from mine because now there are many alternatives to alcohol for young people but the Irish do not see them. Until we face up to that all these issues will remain the same for adults and children.

Even more harrowing is the fact that alcohol is prevalent in all of the child death reports by Dr. Shannon and Norah Gibbons. Is it really worth losing children’s lives for the sake of alcohol abuse? I have been saying this for years and I am so glad that somebody else is saying it. I hope people will listen to Dr. Shannon if they will not listen to us. I hope that people outside this room will take on board the fact that somebody of Dr. Shannon’s calibre and experience has seen this and highlighted the issue. We can have all the child and family support agencies in the world but until we face up to alcohol issue we are at nought. I thank Dr. Shannon very sincerely for highlighting this because it is a problem for so many children and families up and down this country. Until we take it seriously we will back here again and again talking about the failings of systems because we have not lived up to our responsibilities in respect of what is a social and a public health problem.