Mr. Gerry Hone:

We referred to the PPFS programme. There are several examples around the country of projects to create information leaflets and forums for parents to inform them of the risks related to social media and what safety steps they can take to ensure a safer online experience for children. We are still playing catch-up with a lot of this.

A question was asked as to whether special care is sometimes used inappropriately. A lot of our young people who are referred to special care are involved in criminality and are being contacted by criminal gangs through social media with a view to involving them in very heavy-end criminal activity, much of it related to drugs and delivering drugs. We have put some young people in special care to keep them safe and protect them from that type of activity out in the community. One could argue from a children's rights perspective that this is not an appropriate means of protecting those children in that we are locking up the victims rather than perpetrators. We really must be careful about that.