Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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I welcome our guests and thank them for the very interesting report and information. The issue regarding housing is not new to us; we are conscious of it and have been concerned about it for some time. As a personal opinion on the phrase "social housing", for some unknown reason, since we began to use that phrase we have had difficulty meeting the required level of housing. It used to be called "local authority housing" or "public housing". We are aware of the extent to which people are shown to be in fear of losing their housing arising from landlords moving in and so on, and this has been a serious issue in recent years.

I am also conscious of the fact that, throughout Europe, there is a greater history of families living in rented accommodation than applies in this country. In Ireland, 150 years ago, there was a war called the land war. The purpose of the exercise was to establish the right of the individual to own his or her own land or home. This is very much intrinsic in the Irish psyche to this day and will remain that way.

It is seen by people in this country as the foundation on which they build their families and lives. If they do not have that, it tends to engender in their thinking a level of insecurity that does not apply to their counterparts in the rest of Europe where there is a greater tradition of reliance on public housing. I accept, however, that this does not apply in all cases. The interesting part of the study is that which relates to interracial tension. The degree of such tension in Ireland is shown to be low. As a race, we have lived in most countries. Some would say that there are Irish emigrants across the globe as a result of which Irish people have become more accustomed to working with and living in the same areas as other nationalities and they do not see the same level of need to differentiate between one nationality and another. That is a positive.

The findings relating to mental health are alarming. Mental health is an issue about which we are aware, particularly as it affects young women. We are conscious of this issue and have spoken about it in the Houses of the Oireachtas many times. We are aware of the increased incidence of depression, serious depression and self-harm and are monitoring the position. There are a variety of things which we believe to be the cause of these increases, including insecurity, lack of confidence, lack of self-esteem and the use of the Internet by young people who find themselves overwhelmed by what goes on in that regard. There have been numerous incidences of young people engaging in unsuitable dialogue with individuals who are much older than them. This is an area we need to examine further because we must protect our young generation. We must control the technology to which they have access. Such access is increasingly to their detriment. We all engage with our constituents on a daily and weekly basis at our advice clinics and we come across these situations all the time. The incidence of Internet bullying is particularly common among young schoolgirls. Often, a young schoolgirl will find herself the victim of a concerted campaign by girls from within her school, sometimes outside of the school, but most always outside of school time. It is in this regard that technology needs to be controlled. There must be a means found to ensure that young people are not abused in a fashion that undermines their self-confidence and self-esteem to the obvious detriment of themselves and society.

In most other cases, we have scored fairly well. That is reassuring. I agree that the issue relating to childcare costs is serious. Another serious issue is the cost of housing. There is a theory among people globally that one feels better if one lives in a very expensive house. I do not agree. A house is a house is a house. It provides security for children and so on. The theory that if one does not live in a really expensive house one has not made it needs to be addressed, not only in Ireland but throughout Europe. When residential property becomes expensive child care becomes the victim. We have reached a situation where the cost of child care for, say, two, or three, children, even with Government supports, is similar to the cost of a mortgage. This is not sustainable and it puts a huge burden on the family. We need to lower housing costs because mortgage costs are forcing both partners in a household out to work in the early stages of the lives of their children. The cost of a house remains with the family from the day it is purchased it until almost retirement age and this has an overbearing influence on their lives.

On access to health services, Ireland ranks fourth among the OECD countries in terms of its level of expenditure on health services but we do not have the same level of access as our European colleagues. It is impossible to determine the cause in this regard. We have been at odds with ourselves and others in an effort to identify the cause but we think it arises from a multiplicity of factors. If we cannot improve access on the basis of current expenditure as compared with other European countries it raises the question what are we doing wrong. We need to do more about this issue because we should not have to pay more than most other European countries for lesser access.

We hear constantly in European circles about the need to bring Europe closer to the people. For me, this needs to be reversed. People need to move closer to Europe. In moving from the geographical locations across the Continent, we, the people of Europe, will come to realise that we are part of a community and that we have something to contribute to and we can contribute in a meaningful way. We should not resile from that objective and wait for Europe to come to us, which it already does in terms of construction, social cohesion, etc.. In my view, the countries that are waiting for Europe to come to them need to look at the extent to which they can move towards it in order to achieve the European ideal in the way that was originally envisaged.