Pat Buckley (Cork East, Sinn Fein)
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I thank all the witnesses for their presentations. I welcome the visitors in the Gallery. Mr. Pablo Rojas Coppari mentioned stigma in his presentation. While it may be thought that stigma is diminishing, I have always said that stigma has been attached to mental health and suicide since day one. When Rashmi was speaking I could hear his life experience and the battles in his voice. I commend him for that.

Ms Griffith referred to wrap around services, but she will have a very long wait because the services in the country are deplorable at present. We have looked at the staffing issues, but the system is not working. As a committee our role is to improve services but I fear that there are no services in the middle.

I love Dylan's frankness and I commend him for his honesty. I remember watching a documentary in which Dylan appeared with his mother. It is the witnesses who have the life experience and information to inspire the members of the committee. We need to learn from them to try to facilitate everybody.

It is great to be invited into somebody's back garden and I thank Mr. Reilly for that invitation. I would love to visit that health care project and see the bottom up approach to services. We have been speaking about services being provided from the bottom up not from the top down. We need to listen to the people who have experience of the service.

Stigma is a recurring theme, with bullying and discrimination. Today it was reported in the British media that a nine year old boy died by suicide from intensive bullying in school. We have brought this to the attention of the committee. I was a member of the Committee on the Future of Healthcare. This is about education. We need to educate people from their youth to middle age. If we listen to the older people, they will educate us. I congratulate the witness and say well done to them.