Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Barry for raising this important issue. I am conscious that people watching this debate, like all others, could be experiencing mental health challenges. There is support available. There is a very useful website, yourmentalhealth.ie, that can direct people to the supports. I would encourage anybody in need of supports to reach out.

The Deputy was right to highlight this matter. A very serious mental health challenge will emerge from this crisis. People have lost so much certainty in their lives and so much that they had hoped for has now been cast in doubt, at least temporarily. That is why I took the unusual decision, during an interregnum last week, or this day last week, to ask the Government for permission to publish the new A Vision for Change, Sharing the Vision, our new ten-year mental health policy. One would usually wait for a new Government to do this but every Deputy said we should get on with it and publish it. The document will be launched formally by the Minister of State, Jim Daly, tomorrow. Key to the policy — this is my advice to the next Government and this Oireachtas — will have to be the implementation structure. That is where the last document, A Vision for Change, fell down. It will be a matter of the implementation structure and, possibly and respectfully, an Oireachtas mental health committee.

I agree there is a real challenge associated with this. Next week we will be launching a crisis text line, Ireland's first ever 24-7 crisis text line, aimed particularly at younger people with mental health issues. We have provided some additional funding. The Deputies will have noted the additional funding for Pieta House, €114,000 more per month to provide 300 additional counselling hours a month for high-risk clients, in addition to some funding for extra online supports. It is about more than that, however. It will be about how we deal with a whole-of-society mental health challenge arising from the Covid pandemic. I do not disagree with much of what the Deputy said.

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