Brendan Ryan (Labour)

I thank Senator Henry for sharing time with me.

There are issues on which politicians can and do show considerable sensitivity. For the most part, they avoid turning such things into political confrontations. Of course, as an Opposition spokesperson I would say that we should have more resources. However, it would be dishonest to pretend that if we flipped around, with me over there on the Government side and all those others over here, we would suddenly do something dramatic. The truth is that the forces that drive people into self-destructive behaviour, the most extreme of which is suicide, must be examined in a series of ways.

I should probably desist from saying that my wife is a psychiatrist, but I remember her saying to me that if one were to hospitalise everyone who turned up at a psychiatric unit claiming suicidal tendencies, not only would the psychiatric hospitals be full, so would the general hospitals and nursing homes. There is a genuinely difficult clinical judgment to be made by doctors, nurses or whomever makes the decision, and I sympathise with them. The Minister might say that I have to say that, since otherwise I might as well not go home. However, my sympathy is genuine. It is not easy, and my beloved has been involved in unpleasant inquests involving questions about why and how one did or did not act. All one can say is that it was one's best professional judgment. The conscientiousness of the person of whom I speak would never be in dispute.

However, this does not detract from the massive problem. Several points must be made. Michael Kelleher — God rest his soul — whom I knew, pointed out several years ago that the prevalence was quite contrary to our assumed stereotypes. For instance, it is easy to assume, particularly if one has an interest in modern music or literature, to believe that suicide is a consequence of the alienation of urban living. Michael Kelleher wrote an article in The Furrow less than ten years ago stating that in Ireland suicide among young people was more of a rural than an urban problem and had more to do with loneliness in a rural environment than with the perceptions of urban alienation. That was news to me, since I had assumed that it was one of those dreadfully unfortunate consequences of the fracturing of life in urban areas. The evidence did not confirm that, although that is not to say that suicide is not an important issue in urban areas too.

We must reflect a great deal on the self-destructive tendencies that seem to be part of the lifestyle of considerable numbers of younger people. Suicide is not the only one. I have said before in the House that I would be a liar if I pretended I had not been drunk on more than one occasion in my life.