Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)

I very much welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. This is not the first time we have discussed this issue in the House in recent months but I welcome this debate on the importance of mental health and ensuring the resources are in place to help those with mental health issues across the country.

For far too long mental health issues were swept under the carpet and talked about in hushed and sometimes ignorant terms, if they were talked about at all. President Bill Clinton spoke on the subject at length on occasion and once stated that mental illness is nothing to be ashamed of but stigma and bias shame us all. This is an issue that does affect us all.

The most common and familiar manifestation of mental illness is depression. Severe depression can cause paralysis not just of the soul but of the body as well. Those who share their lives with victims of depression are also under incredible strain. It is frightening to see one's loved ones suffering from depression or other forms of mental illness. There can be a feeling of helplessness and of no longer being able to reach or recognise the person one loves.

My involvement and that of other Deputies across the north east is with the Save our Sons and Daughters, Sosad Ireland, organisation with which my colleague, Deputy Doherty, would be familiar. It has brought home to me the urgent need to provide community based services and a community based approach to mental health in general. It is essential that a strong and positive mental health policy should support not just the patients but also provide the families of patients with the knowledge and tools they need to help their loved ones. The best way to do that is through primary care both through our health service but also by working with organisations such as Sosad Ireland, Aware, the Samaritans and so on.

We all agree that our current support system is far from perfect but many positive steps have been taken in recent years. As Deputy Ó Caoláin stated, the era of hiding away or, worse, locking away patients is thankfully on its way out. The vast majority of mental illness problems can and should be treated by primary care. Hospital admission should be reserved for acute cases of severe illness. A total of 90%of mental health problems are now treated at primary care level and the number of involuntary admissions to hospitals has decreased by over 30% in the past five years. That is a credit to the changed conversation we have led in this country around mental health issues, and a change in attitudes also. The recommendations outlined in A Vision for Change continue to be implemented as a series of speakers stated and the Government has committed to ring-fencing €35 million annually to develop the type of community health teams and services that are vitally needed across the country.

It is important also that we remind ourselves of the true aim of health care, which can be often lost on people. The World Health Organisation states that health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. We sometimes lose sight of that particular focus. Too often we focus on the illness and not on the well-being. With mental health issues, as with all health issues, prevention is much better than cure. That is particularly relevant in the case of youth mental health services. I am glad to see the HSE is continuing to support and is seeking to expand initiatives targeted at young people such as the Jigsaw programme with which many Deputies will be familiar. Our end target must be to make that programme and others like it available across the country.

I am pleased that our recently elected President, Michael D. Higgins, has prioritised this area. One of the first initiatives he intends to take is to have a presidential seminar, a national discussion, about what it means to be young in Ireland today and I am sure mental health will provide a focus for that particular discussion.

This country's new approach to mental health is a win-win for everybody. A healthy society is a productive society. Critics will quote statistics marking a reduction in percentage spend on mental health while sometimes conveniently ignoring the successful replacement of outmoded, anachronistic and hugely expensive hospital care with the more effective primary and community based care and interventions we have seen in more recent years.

Our services are far from perfect but I am proud to be part of a Government that is committed to making real improvements in this area, and continues to do so. I am also very proud to be working alongside a Minister of the calibre of the Minister of State, Deputy Lynch, who gets the mental health issue and has encouraged us all to take it on, break down the barriers and speak openly and freely about mental health in our society. This is not the first time we have discussed this issue in the House and I commend the Technical Group for bringing it forward previously. We spoke about it at length in recent months and I hope we continue to do so.

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