Dr. Siobh?n O'Reilly:

Again, that is why we advocate for an approach that is whole-education. You are doing different things at different levels. Obviously, you cannot just walk up to someone and make that approach. I am speaking as a practitioner here. I am located in the anti-bullying centre at the moment but most of my professional career has been in education and community settings. While I think it is really important that those emotionally counsellors are put in place and I really support that, massive amounts of work are being done at school and community level around these very issues. There are youth workers, substance misuse workers, social-care workers and community contacts doing great work around issues of identity and opening conversations and dialogue. It is very relational. It is the social world that we live in. You cannot underestimate the relationship that somebody can have in his or her community context, such as his or her local youth club. When I worked in Ballyfermot I worked in FamiliBase and previously Familiscope there. When we were setting that up, we realised that a young person might start off with a very universal space like a Friday night youth café where he or she might just come in and play pool, access a music workshop or whatever. It is only over time that such people may feel comfortable enough to have a conversation with the youth worker and tell him or her what is actually going on for them. The youth workers then needs to use their set of skills or their tool kit and ask themselves: where is their scope to work here; how far can they bring this and does this require a specialised intervention? Sometimes it may not. Sometimes it may need a supported conversation with mam and dad at home. Sometimes it may need a supported conversation with the school. As Professor Downes said, it is a tiered level of service and intervention and identifying where is the right role for the right piece of work.

I would make another point around family work in particular. Sometimes we found that families were only ready to do therapeutic work two, three or four years down the line when initial situations had been resolved such as conflict in the community or family or maybe an adolescent who was acting out and creating great parenting difficulties and detracting from the younger children. It was possible only when all that was addressed. That is why I really support multidisciplinary working in a community context, including the school. School is a huge part of that. For me, as an educationalist, it is non-formal and formal education. Let us bring those together as much as we can. That would be my practice experience.