Charlie McConalogue (Donegal North East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I join previous speakers in commending Sinn Féin on introducing the Bill and for putting the issue of bullying on the political agenda. I acknowledge this is happening during the week the Minister will publish revised guidelines to tackle bullying in schools. It is more than appropriate that he is bringing them forward because they are overdue and much needed.

Bullying does not only affect students as they go through the education system; it can be a feature of every stage of our lives. All of us will be aware of experiences in our own lives where we came across bullying and witnessed it up close. The difficulty is that schoolchildren are not equipped with the tools to handle it in the way adults can and, because of their vulnerability, there is a requirement on us to ensure we do our utmost to protect and educate them through the policies we implement. We must do our best to have a population which is aware of the issues surrounding bullying in order that everyone can deal with them and assist in challenging them to ensure we move away from past experiences whereby sufficient attention was not given to bullying.

We are considering how the way in which bullying is tackled in our education system can be improved, but the unfortunate reality is bullying always took place in schools and, in too many cases, it involved teachers and students. I have heard countless stories of people subject to corporal punishment by teachers, although this involved a minority of them. There were many fantastic teachers but I never cease to be amazed when conversing with people aged in their 60s and 70s by the pain their memories of these experiences as schoolchildren can elicit. They openly relate their experiences and the indelible mark left on their lives. It is amazing that many of them turned out as well as they did considering what they experienced on a daily basis. That is a barbaric and archaic world to us now 40 years later. That, thankfully, no longer happens and there is a heightened awareness in our society of bullying.

The challenges today presented by the methods of bullying are much different and they have changed radically, even in the past decade. As Deputy Ó Ríordáin said, children have been writing on toilet doors in schools for years. If children are subject to a traumatic experience, the last thing they want is for that to become widely known and to have to deal with that as well. Over recent years, social media websites such as Facebook have mushroomed and people have the ability at the click of a button to publicise anything. Negative experiences for children in school can be magnified by social media and, as a result, rather than just being subject to physical or verbal bullying, which was manageable in the past in the sense that it could be dealt with in school, home or in a sports club because there was supervision, these incidents can be publicised on social media sites and children have to deal with that as well. As a society, we have been playing catch up, as have other many other societies, in the context of the fast changing nature of public and social communications. A few months ago, for the first time a communication via Twitter was the subject of a libel case. Twitter is a common means of communications nowadays but it is only now that the site is becoming subject to the law and that the legal system is getting to grips with its impact. Schools are only now updating their tools to deal with the vastly greater challenges presented on an ongoing basis by social media.

Deputy O'Mahony referred to the bullying of teachers. At the beginning of the social media age, I can recall a website, www.ratemyteacher.ie, which predated Facebook and Bebo. The site demonstrated the impact social media could have on teachers. We became aware more quickly of the site because adults were affected but, too often, we do not recognise when children are affected by something like this because they have not developed the skills to deal with bullying. Children of all ages have fewer peers to whom to reach out because those who are younger than the person affected by the bullying will probably not be in his or her social group while those who are older may have moved on.

A person who is being bullied may have only a confined peer group to reach out to and unless we equip young people to deal with bullying and react to it, we are not dealing with the issue or taking as much action as we can to assist them.

Bullying is linked to self esteem. Too often it is about being able to fit in. It takes a courageous adult, and an even more courageous child, to step in and sort out a bullying situation. Unless we build an environment in which children can become aware of what is going on, bullying will be perpetuated and will not be dealt with. Apart from teachers, the people who are best able to ensure that bullying does not happen are those people who see it happening, the peer group. We must equip them with the tools to assist, intervene and stop bullying when they see it taking place. I hope the guidelines that will be published on Thursday address the issue. Deputy O'Brien's Bill is timely and the Fianna Fáil Party fully supports it. The working group should co-ordinate with the Departments of Education and Skills and Health to ensure a joined-up approach to mental health.

The role of guidance counsellors in issues such as bullying was mentioned more than once in the Dáil in recent weeks. The career guidance survey which was published last week showed that one-to-one counselling hours have been reduced by 50% compared to last year. A profession has been built up over a number of years to a strength of 700 guidance counsellors. These counsellors are trained professionals. In earlier times, counsellors were untrained or partially trained. Each of those 700 counsellors is a qualified counsellor as well as a career guidance adviser. Many of them are now back in the classroom. In several responses on this issue, the Minister for Education and Skills said we need a whole-school approach to guidance, counselling and dealing with students' well-being, including bullying. That is absolutely correct. Everyone must be involved in this issue, including students and teachers at all levels, particularly those who have roles of responsibility. If a student is having a difficulty, where can his teacher send him for one-to-one counselling sessions? Someone needs to answer that door when a student knocks on it. The service needs to be there. There are only so many hours in the school day. If the guidance counsellor is expected to teach classes while also dealing with students' counselling needs, a situation could be exacerbated. Serious consideration must be given to this. Our guidance counsellors are a valuable resource in our secondary schools. We must ensure that the training they have built up over many years is put to best use.

Members received a circular today on the issue of homophobic bullying. This has been particularly prevalent in schools, as well as in the wider society. There has been much progress in society's approach to sexuality. I note the approach of President Obama yesterday in his second inaugural address when he made gay rights a tenet and objective of his second term. This shows how far we have come on this issue, thankfully. There is much more work to be done. The Anti-Bullying Centre in Trinity College Dublin found that 16% of all Irish second level students had been the target of bullying. Supporting LGBT Lives: A Study of Mental Health and Well-Being, funded by the HSE National Office for Suicide Prevention, found that among LGBT people 50% had experienced verbal homophobic bullying, 40% had been verbally threatened by fellow students, 25% had been physically threatened by their peers and 34% had heard homophobic comments from their teachers. This problem is particularly acute. Young people going through the education system are at a stage where they are coming to terms with their sexuality and are unsure of where they are. Having to endure negative comments or bullying behaviour can be stressful and have a severe impact on one's mental health.

Many have advocated that we should restrict social media and access to the Internet. We can put safeguards in place. With regard to online bullying, as well as its more traditional forms, we must educate and equip our students to know how to deal with it and to know the impact of their behaviour. We must resource and equip our teachers and those working in the education sector to support students and educate them. We must provide health care services. Too often, when problems are exacerbated students and young people must spend several months waiting to see the professionals whom they need to see immediately.

I look forward to seeing the proposals when they are published on Thursday. I commend Sinn Féin on putting this issue on the agenda and I support the Bill. I urge the Minister to take note of tonight's debate, consider the Bill and ensure that we take the much needed action to create a safer environment and an education system that best serves our young people.

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