Ms Suzanne Connolly:

Some of the members who are particularly interested in mental health may be aware that there is a big movement now around what is called trauma-informed care and attention. That is recognising that children and young people, and indeed their parents, would often have had adverse childhood experiences that will stay with them throughout their lives unless they get the appropriate type of service. That service needs to recognise that it is necessary to have quite well-researched, informed, professional support for people who have been through the trauma that is adverse childhood experiences. As Barnardos goes forward we want to bring that understanding into all the services that we provide for children and families.

Sometimes people are not able to move on in their lives because they are still carrying the hurts of things that happened to them in the past. One needs to think of ways of working with them that enable them to express those hurts and then move on. The way that will work for people will depend on what they are like, but sometimes it is really about connecting into their bodies, what their body is telling them and then what that will mean about how they can manage their emotions and make different choices.

Something we must be aware of is that knowing what to do does not mean someone will actually do it, as the pain and hurt might be too much. I encourage the committee to examine the evidence on understanding the impact of trauma. Children can sometimes misbehave, particularly in schools, and adults can believe that is deliberate, but the children are just expressing the difficulties in their lives and emotions they do not know how to process. When encountering children who are challenging, adults must ask themselves what is happening to them that has led to them behaving in that way and how can the adults help them. To a certain extent, this is also true of adults. People often engage in addiction and behaviours that are damaging to themselves because they cannot deal with trauma in their lives and the pain of living.