Ms Sinéad Keane:

We have not seen data emerge on this yet from our Text About It service but we do have emerging data on this. It is important that the main issues coming up in our service – we talk to over 50,000 young people every year in this crisis service – are isolation and loneliness. Young people are going online and looking for companionship because of that isolation and the loneliness they feel in society. When we look at the regulation of AI, as I think was mentioned this morning, we also need to invest in our child and adolescent mental health service so that there are in-person supports close to home to which people can go to get support. We also need to invest in our youth services so that there are places in real life where people can go and find that empathic connection such that they are not feeling that high level of loneliness and isolation and then going to AI chatbots for that human connection and potentially getting led down rabbit holes or towards very harmful content and information.