Mr. John Irwin:

I thank the Chairman for the invitation to be here with the committee. I will provide a little context. The ACCS is a management body for 96 post-primary schools right across the country. Ms O'Connor is the principal of one of those schools. It is great to see her here. Our schools involve a joint patronage model and are very democratic in their set-up. At the core of the inclusive nature of our schools is our provision of a comprehensive education for all the children of the community. That is provided for in our deed of trust, which established our schools.

Today's topic of school bullying and its impact on mental health is a significant cause for concern for many across the education sector. Ms O'Connor has referred to a lot of the legislation and the procedures that are in place. Going back to the fundamental legislation, the Education (Welfare) Act 2000, there are the guidelines issued by the National Educational Welfare Board, NEWB, and, from 2013, the anti-bullying procedures for post-primary schools. All of these identify key personnel and were at that time useful in many ways. The concept of the relevant teacher and the identification of relevant personnel in particular areas; the need for agreed strategies across schools; school procedures for dealing with investigations; follow-up recording of bullying behaviour; and the role of the boards of management were all provided for in those documents.

Probably the most significant pieces among all those, though, are the promotion of a positive school culture; a climate in which people can feel free to speak out; and the question of how to try to manage conflict of this nature within the school while engaging the entire school community. A key comment made by one of our principals, who has been very much part of the research involved in a lot of what we do and is referred to in the submission we made, is that bullying will not thrive in a school where people can talk openly. People will feel free to talk openly and honestly where there is a climate of acceptance and a culture of respect. Ms O'Connor and Mr. White have both said that schools are doing tremendous work in this regard and are being supported in many ways by voluntary organisations outside. Ms O'Connor mentioned the "one good adult" that Jigsaw provides, which has now moved on to the "one good school" project. These are all hugely supportive but they are not systemic. We are depending on the support of these initiatives on a voluntary basis.

Creating this climate is a considerable amount of work for schools. What does it involve? We have programmes in place, and over recent years curricular change has taken place such as in the area of social, personal and health education, well-being, and the development of positive transition programmes between primary and post-primary to make sure that students entering the school are inducted in a positive way. However, significant training for staff is required. There is a strong emphasis in a lot of schools on restorative practices and trying to facilitate the student voice. Going back to the comment made by the principal to whom I referred, they are very much involved with the Lundy model and in the idea of the circle and in trying to provide safe spaces for students to be able to engage and to be involved. We in the ACCS, as a management body, have been involved with the NCCA and UCC for the past two years on a significant project about the student voice. We are just about to produce a journal on that which we would be very happy to share with the members of the committee when it comes in. While the student voice has got a hell of a lot more to do than just address bullying, its power and the transformative nature the student voice can have within school communities cannot be overestimated.

I agree with Mr. White and Ms O'Connor: we have looked at the traditional - if that is the correct word - forms of bullying involving an intention of harm, repetition over time and a power imbalance. However, the whole area of cyberbullying has exploded in recent years. Mr. White and Ms O'Connor have referred to research. We have more research again referenced in our submission to the committee about the numbers involved. The Joint Committee on Media, Tourism, Arts, Culture, Sport and the Gaeltacht recently reviewed the online safety and media regulations Bill and brought in students from two of our schools. Their research, which was pretty much up to date as they prepared for those talks, was very consistent with everything we are hearing today. They would say that around 16% of students have experienced direct bullying online and that 26% of students have witnessed bullying online. That is all consistent with what we are hearing from EU research, DCU and the WHO. They came up with excellent recommendations for that committee as to how we might address some of the issues, and it might be worth liaising between the committees and taking a joint approach across them. One of the things we have found is-----