Shane Cassells (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Can I make one comment please on the retention of young female athletes in football or in any particular sport? I refer to the Ladies Gaelic Football Association, LGFA, because I am dealing with that association. We talk about the negative aspects of social media. There are also very many positives. I praise the LGFA for the social media campaign that it is running at the moment called The Greatest Gift to encourage parents to stay on the sideline and to actually watch their children playing. There is a great number of parents who come to games, drop their children and are gone, and do not bother to see the value of watching their own children playing. If they spend that hour, perhaps one might not quite have a scenario of hate, anger or any of those aspects developing then later in life. I wish to praise that particular social media campaign. The fact that they are using the Meath ladies to promote it is also fantastic.