Mr. Brian Crean:

I wish to discuss mental health for a moment before we move on to access for deaf children and the hearing families they are born into. When it comes to mental health, I may wish to avail of counselling but I may not get the opportunity to avail of it. I lived in the United States for a while. I am trying get my thoughts together. Hearing people may hear advertisements on the radio for support services that exist. However, often we find ourselves having to wait until someone asks us whether we knew X existed. When it comes to access to mental health services and awareness of the services, all deaf people have limited access. This applies even to awareness about services such as help lines and so on. We may not even know where to begin.

Senator Clifford-Lee asked a question relating to timing and the attitude that exists. Sometimes parents are not encouraged to sign with their children and instead are encouraged to try to get them to speak first. Then the view is that if speech is not working out, Irish Sign Language is something that we can use. However, the European Union of the Deaf, EUD, and the World Federation of the Deaf, WFD, have carried out research showing that sign language is the key and that the key to success is provision of sign language as early as possible.