Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the report of the Joint Committee on Children and Youth Affairs which follows other reports and debates at other committees, including the Joint Committee on Education and Skills, of which I am a member. I can speak with some authority on the subject, although perhaps not specifically about childhood obesity. Six years ago I was 4 stone heavier than I am now. I took some measures to reduce my weight in the past few years which were necessary in my interests and those of my family. All of us in society need to examine what we are doing. People ask me what the secret is or what worked for me and the answer is simple: eat less and move more. If we try to put that into practice on our plates and in planning, we can make a difference.

The real reason the issue of childhood obesity is so important is that there is some evidence, although it is not conclusive, that obesity is not reversible or at least that it becomes increasingly difficult to reverse the longer it continues. While there are stories about people who have done well, it is very difficult to do it. In the case of children who are obese, as well as adults, it can be a death sentence, or at least a life sentence of suffering from high blood pressure and various diseases that flow from it. People need to be made aware of these issues in the starkest possible terms. Obesity can kill and kills many people in various ways. I am forever grateful that I copped on to the problem.

I was not the sportiest person in the world while in school or growing up. My father played soccer in the League of Ireland; my wife has played for four counties and - thanks be to God - my kids play sport all the time. The most important gift we can give to kids is letting them play. While I fully agree that there is a need for far more physical education facilities in schools and the deficit is outrageous, we should allow kids more time in the yard to move around and take classes outside when the weather is good. Even in our own case, we could take phone calls from constituents while walking up and down Molesworth Street, rather than sitting at a desk. That can make a difference and I try to put it into practice. It is disgraceful that in some urban areas, including parts of my constituency, there are schools and places to which one cannot walk or cycle. It is outrageous that there are schools with 400 or 500 children to which nobody can walk because they are on busy roads in suburban areas and often there are no footpaths. Furthermore, there is no proactive effort by the Department of Education and Skills or the Department of Health to insist on cycling buses, for example, such as exist in Amsterdam and other European cities. I saw them featured on news programmes.

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