Dr. Aileen McGloin:

The committee will have seen from our more detailed submission that we are very active in the childhood obesity area. We have community food initiatives, food poverty initiatives, education resources and campaigns. I will highlight the START campaign, which we launched last year in conjunction with Healthy Ireland, the HSE and partners in Northern Ireland in the form of the Public Health Agency. It is important that this campaign has been co-created with the target audience. We went to lower income areas throughout the country to ensure we spoke with the audience that would need us most. We developed messages and a campaign that truly resonated with those people. As Dr. Foley-Nolan pointed out, parents are under huge pressure and do not want to be told what to do by agencies. They have busy lives and much responsibility. We wanted to emphasise that every effort they make to improve a child's life from a physical activity and food perspective has an impact. The motif was date-stamping a certain time when mum decided to switch to fruit or have a healthier breakfast.

It is all those tiny decisions throughout the day that make the difference between being healthy and being unhealthy as a family. It is a five-year campaign with partners. We want to get the messages out about eating fewer treats, consuming fewer sugary drinks, being more active, having less screen time and so on that are clear and consistent and go throughout all the touch points that are important in children's lives, namely GP surgeries, crèches, schools, hospitals and also through the media.