Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)

I welcome the opportunity to say a few words on the seventh report on the high level of suicide in Irish society. In common with other speakers, I am not an expert on suicide but, like them, I have dealt with scores of constituents whose family circle has been touched by the problem. We have all been contacted by people who are in distress for one reason or another.

I acknowledge the tremendous work done by my colleague, Deputy Neville, in pursuing the causes of suicide in an effort to prevent suicide and highlight those who are vulnerable to it. We all owe him a debt of gratitude. It is no harm to discuss the causes of suicide. Internationally, the number of suicides appears to track the number of deaths in road traffic accidents. This trend suggests that the level of development and affluence in societies may be a contributory factor.

We would learn a great deal if we could ascertain what drives people from depression into despair. We have all known people who have become depressed. It could be due to failure in an examination. Consider the pressure on young people in second level schools studying for the junior certificate and leaving certificate. That continues later in college.

Society has become extremely demanding and aggressive. It has set high standards and we must aspire to meeting those standards. However, not everybody in society is capable of keeping up with the pack. There is a tendency for people in that situation to feel squeezed out and incapable of ever achieving a degree of fulfilment. When it reaches the stage that they get the impression, wrongly, that they cannot reach the degree of fulfilment which they believe others have, the depression becomes despair and they move on.

Young people need an anchor; they need something in society that is solid, that they can identify with and that they believe will give them encouragement and security regardless of how they measure up. This is most important. Several speakers have referred to bullying in school. It is an important issue and not enough is done about it. I have raised the issue many times in the House. There is a failure to follow up on bullying by reporting, recording and identifying it. Each school has its own way of dealing with the matter but that is not the solution. There should be a co-ordinated reporting system, whereby an investigation is undertaken into the causes. We must try to put ourselves in the shoes of a school child who has been the victim of bullying and consider the isolation, fear and absolute depression that must haunt that child.

Speakers have referred to teenage suicides. We have an extremely aggressive and impersonal society. Oddly, when there was no affluence in this country, its society was inclusive. We shared what we had with each other. That is not so easy now. A different society has emerged. It is an aggressive society with a hard edge. This is encouraged in many quarters as being necessary to succeed economically. That may well be the case but people have succeeded economically previously without excluding others.

I recall being a member of the health board some years ago. On the retirement of a matron of one of the much maligned rural hospitals we were asked to say a few words about her. At the time, the most important feature I could discern was that she brought a personal touch to an impersonal world. This was some years ago. She was an anchor for people. She always had an encouraging word for everybody. Instead of breaking down the character of a person or creating further doubt in their mind, she had the ability to say something or relate to them in such a way that they felt better. That is the best thing one could say about a health care worker.

Alarmingly, almost 75% of suicides are young males, yet more women suffer from depression. Approximately one in four women is affected by it. There is something wrong that we have not yet identified which causes the depression to progress to despair and leads to a person taking his or her life. We are familiar with the many current descriptions of society — the ready-made society, the disposable society, the customer-driven society, the consumer society, the oven ready society and so forth. If everything does not fit in properly, a problem arises.

Perhaps we should not be so keen to assure the young generation that everything will be provided and that the highest standards will always prevail. Our generation did not have a great deal but we were willing to share it. The trend now, however, is that when young people are faced with an obstacle in their life, they do not appear to have the ability to cope with it. At that stage, sadly, the depression becomes despair. This is a situation society must address.

All Members have dealt with cases in their constituency involving suicide. They are very sad cases. In most cases the psychiatric services have engaged with young people, particularly in second level institutions. However, if one offers one's assistance, advice or local knowledge, one will be quickly told it is a confidential matter and that one is not competent to discuss the issue. It is about time that this sector of the health service got a rude awakening. Local elected public representatives are, in many cases, in possession of far more information than somebody who graduated last year and has suddenly become an expert. I have been in this situation on more than one occasion. At this stage of my life, I am tired of being told that something is so confidential it cannot be discussed with me. That is a clear sign of an insular attitude, which is bad, defeatist and self-serving.

The degree to which there are vocations in society is not nearly as great as it was previously. That applies to all professions, including our own. In the past, the aim of helping others was the biggest single factor in convincing people to put themselves forward as public representatives. That is no longer the case. There is ample evidence to suggest that more and more people who come into politics see it as a job, and that at a certain time of the day that job switches off. Unfortunately, that is not the case. A time will come again when people will realise that a vocational commitment in the vital services is critical for service delivery and fulfilling the expectations of the individual. Society must become more inclusive and more supportive of individuals. It must be more willing to recognise that just because people have more money, they cannot afford to be in the fast lane all the time without negative consequences.

Mention must be made of drugs and drink. We have all met people in the aftermath of indulging in drugs and drink who are in a serious state not just due to hangovers but also to depression. I do not know the answer to this problem. We talk about the need for less consumption and less dependence on drink. Undoubtedly, there is a growth in the consumption of the shots youngsters drink nowadays to reach a certain level of inebriation in the shortest time possible. When I was young it would take a week to consume sufficient alcohol to produce the same degree of inebriation as can be achieved these days in half an hour. There is a vast difference now in the degree to which a person is prepared to achieve a colossal level of inebriation by pumping hard drink into his or her system to achieve that level quickly. There is no question of them drinking pints of shandy because they would not get drunk very quickly if they did so.

We must consider the position vis-À-vis the club scene. People involved in the latter appear to engage to a major degree in "topping up" before entering a club or while they are there. The club scene carries on beyond the normal pub closing time. In many cases, colossal amounts of alcohol and drugs are being consumed on a nightly basis. This can have nothing other than a serious impact on the stability of those who are consuming them. If any Member consumed such an amount of alcohol or drugs in one day or during a two-hour period at night, he or she would not be able to work the following day.

I was a member of a health board when the major psychiatric hospitals underwent a massive change, namely, that of closing down and engaging in a changeover to community treatment. That was a great development. However, at the time I stated that the support required in the community in this regard would have to be of a good standard. That support is not as good as it should be and that is one of the main reasons certain people are, to a large extent, floating along from day to day. Careful consideration must be given to that matter.

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