Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 10 February 2022

Joint Oireachtas Committee on the Implementation of the Good Friday Agreement

Engagement with Co-operation and Working Together

Mr. Neil Guckian:

I will make a brief comment. We need to make sure that it links back to health and social care outcomes first and foremost. When we look at that for mental health services, quite often the engagement of the relevant community can reflect the confidence that people have in the relevant service. Therefore, if individuals do not have confidence in a particular service, our experience is that they will not engage with the particular service. This is about breaking down those barriers. That alone can show that people will have confidence. It is about aligning the outcomes in order that we are able to demonstrate to the EU that a particular project will work. It is also about making sure that we can get the public and the people affected, particularly in services like mental health that have a stigma attached to them, to engage with whatever approach we take and that they can see a lifetime outcome improvement. Would Mr. Forbes like to add to that?