Ms Sinéad McGee:

If a child breaks a leg, he or she is brought to an accident and emergency department for an X-ray and the leg is put in a cast for six weeks. When the cast comes off, the child might need some physiotherapy. It is very black and white and one knows exactly what to do and where one stands. With mental health issues, that is not the case. With many young people I have come across, the problem is hidden and they are not shouting out that they will hurt themselves. They do it. We might see them vomiting and wonder about it but they have already acted. Primary care is so important. One should be able to go to a GP and be referred to primary care, regardless of age. It should not matter. If a person is having suicidal or self-harming thoughts and is not in a good place, it is the time to get help. We should not wait until these young people do something. We should look to prevention of a long road being taken in mental health services.

I hate hearing about waiting lists and we have heard of the struggles of parents here and the ones I have spoken to. I hate hearing that a young person is not well but is on a waiting list. It fills me up every time as it is so wrong. There is a staffing problem as well. I attend the management meeting for the Dublin north county and city CAMHS and they do everything. They have worked so hard and put so much effort in but they only have whatever resources they have. They do not want people on waiting lists and they want to be able to take people in straight away, but there are no resources for that. That must be examined.

The other part is that staffing should not be all locums and temporary staff. If they have completed their trial period, they should be made permanent. That would provide continuity for the young person and for us, so that we are not going in and meeting a brand new therapist every time. With every new therapist, our children have to start all over again and go through their story from day one, where they have been, how they got here - it is just very unfair. It is for young people. Let us try to get them out of the mental health services and onto the road to recovery. Primary care is definitely the way to go. We need to put a lot of resources and money into it.