Ms Lynsey Kavanagh:

To follow on from Ms Fay, there is no impediment to the collection of ethnic data as it relates to GDPR or data protection legislation. That has been used as the rationale by some State agencies and Departments not to do it. The Department of Education has an ethnic identifier in its primary school online database, which is its data collection system, and other State agencies have also implemented the ethic identifier. Pavee Point worked to support the implementation and roll-out of the ethnic identifier. That is one of the key issues and we are saying there is no legal impediment. The Data Protection Commissioner has confirmed that. Some of the barriers were highlighted by Deputy Hourigan and Ms Fay in terms of data collectors being uncomfortable asking the questions. It is important that we build training mechanisms into any roll-out of the ethnic identifier. Some 98% of people answer the census question. It is the same question on ethnicity, which is a testament to the fact that people are very comfortable once they know the rationale for why it is being asked. That is one of the key pieces to ensuring that where the ethnic question is introduced that people are given a clear rationale and that those who are asking it are also given adequate training.

Some mental health services have an ethnic identifier but others do not, so there are massive gaps and it is very much fragmented. We are saying it is Government policy and we want to make sure that it is rolled out across the board so that we have the evidence and the data to make smart, effective policies.