Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I come from an era when people used a telephone. Our guests probably do not remember that in order to make a call one had to go into a phone box and when somebody stood close to the phone box one had to open the door and say to the person, "Do you mind? I am on a call." As a result, people would back away. Now, people who are on mobile phones tell the dear, sweet secrets of their lives as they are sat beside you on a Luas.

The mobile phone has been the greatest and worst invention of all time. I will mention one of the things that deeply concerns me, and I do not know how ComReg can examine this matter but I would like it to try. By the way, I appreciate what the ComReg delegation has done today and it has been very refreshing to hear their answers. Some years ago I was president of the Teachers Union of Ireland and the week I took over two 11-year-old girls took their own lives. One of them took her life on a Friday night and the following one was her twin sister, who took her life four or five days later. Mobile phones were the cause of it. It was the standard online bullying or whatever. The reason I raise this matter is as follows. I visited the school and the school was in disarray. Every single evening the principal of the school sat in his car between 7 o'clock and 11 o'clock at night while members of staff would ring him and say such and such is on this social media channel now or someone else was on another one. Eventually the situation crowded in on him. He made the point to me, and I think it is one we must find a way around, that in the evening parents take their children home, prepare them for bed, get them to say their prayers or whatever but ensure their children follow a night-time routine that includes brushing their teeth before they get into their beds. However, parents allow their children to bring their mobile phones to bed and they allow them to be switched on. We all know that people can access anything on a mobile phone now but, worse still, people can be accessed on their mobile phone. The principal made the point to me that he is responsible for children in this school from 8.30 a.m. until 4.30 p.m. but after that the responsibility rests with somebody else.