Brendan Ryan (Labour)

I stated previously when discussing suicide and other similar tragedies that I am reluctant to get involved in Government bashing. That reluctance is not my normal style but apart from a couple of comments I will not do so. The strategy was slow to arrive and, as with many issues, the Government did not appear to wake up to the scale of the problem until quite late into its second term.

Psychiatric services have always been the poor relations in the health services and I happily accept that is true not only during the term of office of the present Government. I do not know if that will change under the new regime. There is no doubt that every time a shortage of funds or a serious constraint occurred, one of the areas where health service managers in both the HSE and its predecessors sought cutbacks quickly was in psychiatric services. I have reason to be aware of that from family connections. Delay upon delay occurred in services for people with psychiatric illnesses. I know this from listening to long late-night conversations between a consultant psychiatrist and various junior doctors about where a bed might be found for a seriously ill patient. I know only too well about the scarcity of beds.

The Minister of State is always welcome and I stated previously in his presence that if everybody who threatened self-harm or stated they were suicidal were to be hospitalised, not only would every acute bed in psychiatric services be occupied, but also every acute bed in every hospital. Professional judgments must be made and we must ensure that we have the professional skills available, everywhere and all of the time, to make good professional judgments in these cases. I take it from the strategy that we are endeavouring to do so. We must ensure that people who are seriously at risk are not turned away. At the same time we cannot have a policy of admitting everybody.

The late and much lamented Dr. Michael Kelleher stated on many occasions that we would be foolish to view suicide as a predominantly urban phenomenon. Dr. Kelleher's figures, which are a few years old, show that suicide was an acute rural problem, particularly suicide outside younger age groups. It was a product of isolation, old age and loneliness.

I cannot take issue with the national strategy, although perhaps €500,000 is little more than a token gesture for a strategy to deal with one of the most heartbreaking problems the country has. The Government might not be correct to leave out targets although it may be correct to delay setting targets because current figures are unreliable. However, it should only be delayed until reliable figures are established. The Government's strategy should then be to match the best that has been achieved internationally. I would have some sympathy with that, but not much.

I will assume the strategy is delivered for the purposes of this debate. I would find it distasteful to recite my usual scepticism about the Government in this area because I wish it well on this. I wish to believe it is a serious attempt that will be followed through and is not merely an exercise to grab headlines and prove the Government is taking action. I am increasingly sceptical about the school of politics that believes action must be taken. Action that makes a difference must be taken. Politicians must not merely be seen to take action.

I will accept the strategy will be followed through, properly funded and universally available. I hope that subsumed into it will be the beginnings of an awareness, not merely in our psychiatric and medical services but also in our society, of the actions we are taking with regard to young men in particular and young people generally. Only four or five years have passed since a member of the same class as my then 14 year old son committed suicide. As a parent I cannot imagine much worse that could happen to a family than for any member to commit suicide, particularly a child. Even though I talk about it, I never really want to think about it. Nobody would. It had a profound effect on every member of that class, which will work its way through each one. I knew most of them. They were sensible, good natured, fairly well focused and stable boys and girls from a variety of backgrounds, and it will reverberate through their lives. One only hopes some good will come of it.

In that context let us remember the pressures on young men. I do not excuse wrong behaviour, but any self-aware young man faces a range of expectations. He is probably expected to do extremely well academically, because everybody now expects to do well. Large numbers of parents cannot accept that not all their children are academically brilliant — they blame an illness or the school — and children are at the centre of enormous ambition and pressure. In my other work I have seen youngsters reluctant to tell their parents that they got only second class degrees. While they had achieved the level anticipated by their lecturers, their parents had never adjusted to this expectation.

Young people are fed an illusion that people have limitless income. They are launched into a world where to buy is to be. Every real person is aware that this is illusory, but young people are subject to a range of pressures. As many people working in sport will attest, there is an increasing expectation to be macho. It is disappointing that people working with young people in sport say it is more difficult than ever to persuade youngsters not to retaliate if they are fouled. One is tough only if one retaliates while not to retaliate is regarded, more than previously, as a sign of weakness. It is more difficult to explain the rationale for not retaliating. I invite anyone who shares this view to read Roy Keane's biography, in which he flagellates himself for his lack of maturity when he retaliated.

I hope Members do not snigger at my next point. Therapists tell me there is an increasing expectation on young men to perform as studs in a way that did not exist ten years ago. I am told that significant numbers of young men have stopped socialising because they cannot handle expectations about their capacity to perform sexually. Those factors, along with an increasingly sexualised culture, in which children are sexualised from the age of ten years, put at risk people who are already vulnerable as they go through changes that happen at different rates in each person.

I take issue from an intellectual, not a political, position with many of the values of the Government. I do not say that the Government created these values but it articulates them well. We have an individualistic culture based on the illusion of instant gratification, where any suggestion of delayed gratification — that sometimes one must do without or make sacrifices — has no merit. I know what competition does in terms of economic performance, but inside every increasingly competitive market are human beings who have limited ability to cope with the increasing pressures of work and performance. People who work in financial services say it is standard practice to increase targets each year. If one fails to achieve a target one is in trouble. If one does achieve it, the target is ratcheted up the following year. That sort of expectation has an unimaginable impact on young people. The response is the work hard, play hard culture, and playing hard usually means alcohol. The Minister of State knows better than I, not because of his drinking habits but because of his profession, that alcohol is a depressant. If people are suffering from the pressures of life and feeling overwhelmed by them, the worst thing they can do is try to drown their sorrows. In the long term it will exacerbate their depression. Our society promotes a way of life that makes bad situations worse.

I have frequently spoken in this House of the illusion that Governments, not just the present one, try to reward effort. In fact, we do not reward effort but success, and we brand people who are not successful as "losers". This is one of the most offensive terms but it is common parlance now. In conclusion, somebody on the political left must deal with these issues because most of society runs away from them. One of our problems is that society has changed profoundly and every signpost of good ethical behaviour is gone. All the institutions that offered ethical guidance are either impoverished or undermined by their own misbehaviour, and the Minister knows what I am talking about. Our young people are floundering without a moral compass. They have the illusion of escape given by such people as Kurt Cobain. We must re-establish an ethical consensus. Scandinavian countries, where there is no strong religious tradition, have a social ethic. If we are about to move away from a religious ethic as the compass by which we live our lives, we need to replace that with a social ethic based on a set of values, one of which is that human life is precious and that suicide is never an acceptable response to a human crisis.