Mary White (Fianna Fail)

I compliment the Minister and his young wife, Sinéad, and wish them the best of luck. They are a wonderful couple with complementary skills. I wish them happiness and that they will have many achievements to their names at the end of the day. I am sympathetic to and have empathy with what Senator Healy Eames said. As I was out of the country last week I did not see the "Prime Time Investigates" report but I have in my hand a document published a month ago. We did not have to wait for "Prime Time Investigates" to hear what goes on, but like so many issues in Ireland we have report after report and very little is done. It is interesting that it has to be on television to catch the imagination of the politicians and the public.

Ireland has been seriously criticised by Europe's top human rights watchdog for failing to adequately protect children under State care. The first comprehensive report on Ireland's human rights record carried out by the Council of Europe warns that many foreign children are in danger of being trafficked for exploitation because they get insufficient care at State-provided accommodation. It expresses deep concern on the large numbers of children who have already gone missing from centres that house mainly asylum seekers. I recommend the Minister of State get a copy of this 58-page report by Mr. Thomas Hammarberg, the Commissioner for Human Rights on the Council of Europe. There is a large section in it, section 3.3, on children and not just on the missing children. I do not want to go into detail on it but it is exactly what I heard was on "Prime Time Investigates". This Council of Europe report has identified that we do not adequately look after children who are put into care, nor do we have the same proportion of social workers for them as we do for children in normal settings.

I am the Fianna Fáil spokesperson on children in the Seanad and we should very shortly call for a full debate on children generally. I am writing a report on suicide and its prevention in Ireland and will have it available within three weeks. I have been studying the issue since last September. We have serious inadequacies in the health service as it deals with children. Unlike other consultants attached to hospitals, a consultant child psychiatrist attached to Our Lady's Children's Hospital, Crumlin has no dedicated beds in the hospital for children with psychiatric problems. My research has indicated that there are children who are threatening suicide and are not able to get help. When they attend a psychiatrist in the community service, the psychiatrist has no bed to put them in. The consultant psychiatrist has no dedicated beds in the children's hospital; what a crime.

I visited Our Lady's Children's Hospital, Crumlin for the first time a month ago. Fortunately I had no reason to go there for my own child. It should have been pulled down 30 years ago. I was shocked by the physical structure of the building. Will the new children's hospital be in the middle of the city? It is not the right place to put it. Is it carved in stone that it will be there? Where is the fresh air in the city for the children? It is a small site. Why is it in the middle of the city?

I had no chance to read the Minister of State's speech but Senator Corrigan mentioned he said the HSE was examining the provision of social services after 5 p.m. and at weekends. I am sick of listening to that. I do not blame the HSE but the Department of Health and Children. The HSE has asked the Department of Health and Children to make social workers available after 5 p.m. every day and at weekends. In the two cases of filial suicide in the south east no social services were available out of hours. That is a crime. I do not want to hear that the HSE has put a proposal to the Department. Will the Department get its act together? Will IMPACT get its act together too? It is as bad. There are 11 dedicated positions for suicide prevention officers and three positions have not been filled.

I had a meeting with Dr. Patrick Doorley, the director of public health and planning with the HSE and I asked him why we have to wait because there is an embargo on filling positions. What about somebody among the 130,000 people who work in the HSE being willing to take up those positions? It is a matter of urgency that the out-of-hours social services be implemented immediately. It has been proven in other countries that where out-of-hours or emergency social workers and psychiatrists are available, suicide levels decrease. The lack of out-of-hours services comes through in the report on children in care and in Mr. Hammarberg's report. We need a full debate on the Minister of State's entire portfolio.

The Minister of State may have examined the OECD report on the public service and the hoped-for future efficiency of the public sector. It is a serious issue. Having been a public servant for two terms and a business person for 16 years, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, there must be some common sense that unions in the public sector cannot resist deployment of people where there is a crisis or staff are not available. It is not good enough.

There is a tremendous challenge in front of the Minister of State, but it is also a personal opportunity. We have a crisis in psychiatric services for children in Ireland. My study shows that in the ages zero to 14 there is no suicide, although from my expert advice I believe there are children with serious mental problems, but from the age of 14 to 19 the suicide rate increases drastically. We must get the child psychiatric services sorted to address the crisis in suicide numbers in Ireland. We have a suicide epidemic in the country. To prove my point that out-of-hours service is so important, most suicides and self harm episodes take place on Sundays and follow into Monday and one of the reasons is that there are no social services or psychiatrists on duty to help people in trouble.