Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am one of the final speakers and many of the pertinent questions have been asked. I apologise in advance if I end up repeating a few points. I will pick up on Dr. Keating's contribution earlier where she referenced that many teachers who teach the social, personal and health education, SPHE, modules in schools are not qualified to teach that very module. As a teacher, I found myself as one of those and I got the extra few hours in civic, social and political education, CSPE, SPHE or whatever it was. Going forward as a profession, it should be the minimum that teachers are qualified to teach that relevant subject considering the importance we place on well-being.

From much of the testimony given by the witnesses today I put it that we are ticking many boxes in terms of what our boards of management and school management must comply with. We need, however, to recognise that tackling bullying goes beyond just ticking boxes and having anti-bullying policies and so forth. Many people in this room will have sat at board of management meetings over the years and the one thing that comes up is the bullying incidents that month. It might not always be a box-ticking exercise but, certainly, looking from the outside in, it feels that way on reflection.

Many of my questions have already been answered but I will focus on one or two practical issues from a school point of view and being a teacher. In its submission, the ABC made the point that teachers do not always feel responsible for helping students deal with cyberbullying. Will the witnesses elaborate on the responsibilities teachers have with regard to being professionals and employees? What are their responsibilities?

My second question relates to the reference that teachers often respond ineffectively and express a need for additional training. Will the witnesses elaborate on what training is currently in situfor teachers and what training, if any, they propose would be beneficial to teachers in terms of continuing professional development, CPD?

My third question relates to guidance counsellors. A number of years ago, as everybody is well aware, a number of guidance counsellor roles were taken out of the education system. Since the restoration of guidance counsellors have the witnesses found instances of bullying and cyberbullying are being treated more efficiently or are the instances of bullying and cyberbullying continuing to escalate despite their restoration? Perhaps the witnesses could just comment on the importance of the role of guidance counsellors in that respect.

There was a reference to research carried out by ABC at the end of 2016 that less than half of school principals had a designated person to deal with anti-bullying cases in schools. When I heard that I was astounded. My experience with boards of management goes back perhaps five or six years and every board I have been involved with, which by my count is seven, has had a designated person to deal with it and has ticked those boxes. I was astounded to see, albeit the research goes back to 2016, that half of schools were non-compliant in that regard and no research might have been done since that report in 2016. Even if ABC has anecdotal research, however, has that improved? Is there further compliance with that?

My final question concerns the Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Bill 2017, or Coco's law, which is before the Dáil. I believe it is on Third Stage at present. Can I get the witnesses' professional opinion on that? Perhaps, the question is for Dr. Milosevic. What is her professional opinion on the premise of that Bill and criminalising online bullying? What are her opinions on that?