David Norris (Independent)

I welcome this debate and I welcome the Minister of State to the House. I must say, as a random observation, it is interesting that the Minister of State and the overwhelming number of speakers in the debate were women. Women have demonstrated that they are the people who care about the basic issues.

The basic issues are clear, and they have been dealt with fairly extensively. They are smoking and drinking alcohol. There is no question or doubt about that. There is a huge distortion in terms of the alcohol figures, and I believe the Minister of State put those on the record. We are 50% above the European norm. This is described as our culture. I find that insulting. It is not our culture the way people drink alcohol in this country, the way they damage themselves and the way they behave in public. This is an increasing phenomenon.

In view of the short time available I direct the Minister of State to the debate held in this House on the alcohol Bill during which many strong points were made. Some were taken up by the Government but it did not go as far as suggested from this side of the House particularly in terms of the control of advertising, among other things.

Politicians are too close to the drinks industry in this country in the same way as we have discovered they were too close to the construction industry. That relationship must be broken. Traditionally, politicians held their clinics in pubs and so on, and we have a representative of the Licensed Vintners Association in the Seanad. They have a very strong lobby and they do not always tell the truth. They do target young people. Sports sponsorship is an obscenity and a contradiction. Alcohol is something that has clearly damaged the health of the country yet we allow it to get in and target young people.

The same applies to smoking. I am very glad this country showed a lead in banning cigarette smoking because this is the second major element in terms of what we need for a health promotion strategy. Traditionally, the tobacco companies have been corrupt. They falsified evidence. They deliberately included additional chemical elements that had an addictive effect. They denied research. They lied in court in America, and they are now targeting the most vulnerable countries in the developed world to off-load their cigarettes.

We need to be aware that the drinks and the tobacco industries are two powerful groups who have no scruples. That is a change. In the old days in Ireland there was Uncle Arthur, John Jameson and the old Midleton distillery but that is gone. Nowadays the players are the big multinational corporations. They do not make their decisions here. They make their decisions looking at a graph in London or New York and it is a question of profit. It is not a question of the social damage that is being done. The mass of ridiculous groups that are established are nothing but a camouflage.

We need to get into the schools early and make sure that drinking is not seen as something heroic. I hear commentators on the radio and people on chat shows promote it subliminally. They refer to being plastered, having a hangover or that they had a few bevies. That is the way it is insidiously eating into what we see as our culture.

There is also the question of accident and emergency services. Part of the promotion of health should be to penalise people. We only have to look at the distortion in the way accident and emergency situations are dealt with because of the influx of people under the influence of drink and drugs at the weekends. We should look, too, at the collateral nuisance caused, the proliferation of off-licences and the way in which licences are being given out throughout the city.

I am on the Dublin central policing committee. I raised this issue and a report was commissioned. When it came back it was all done in terms of competition policy. There was no element of health or the social good involved. I insisted that the report be withdrawn and rewritten, as it was, but that was the priority. Competition is a little god. It appears to be more important than people's health and welfare. We can give disincentives to people by making it unattractive to smoke or drink alcohol, and the Government could do a good job on that.

I want to raise another element — spitting in the street. That went out when I was a child because every bus had advertisements saying "Don't spit in public". One could be fined for doing it. It was a serious offence but now the pavements are a mess with spit. We need to promote awareness in this area. It is partly our own fault and it is partly due to people who have come from other cultures where spitting is part of the daily routine but it is a dangerous way of spreading disease. To return to the question of alcohol, in the inner city where I live people use the pavements as public lavatories.

A number of other issues arise such as AIDS. When was the last time we had an AIDS prevention programme directed at young people? I can tell the Minister of State that in terms of sexual hygiene that message has got lost. AIDS is no longer seen as a death sentence. It is seen as something one can live with. It is not treated as seriously as it should be. We need a programme in place.

The issues of bullying and suicide were raised, and the figures outlined regarding young males in particular. Under that there is also a concealed figure for those people who are gay, and that must be tackled head on. A total of 80% of the bullying in schools has a homophobic element but in 80% of cases nothing is done because, among other things, the teachers are afraid. That is why it is wonderful that we have schools like Educate Together.

I was invited to Griffith Barracks Educate Together national school. When I was half way there I phoned my secretary to ask if it was a secondary school. She said it was a primary school. I was there to talk about the gay issue as a human rights issue. I was concerned but it was marvellous because of the context in which they put it. If that had been there when I was a child it would have been so positive and hopeful. Under the suicide figures there are many young men who are depressed and confused about their sexual identity.

With regard to the suicide figures, we used to regard ourselves as the best of the lot and compared ourselves favourably with Scandinavian countries in that they were either godless or Protestants. We were a good Catholic country. Suicide did not exist. Now we have information on the rates but it reveals only part of the picture. In the United Kingdom, for example, the authorities factor in undetermined deaths when computing the annual figures. We do not do that, even though a significant proportion of undetermined deaths are actually by suicide. I ask the Minister of State to give consideration to this matter.

I compliment the Minister of State upon her interest in this area. There is no doubt that further health promotion initiatives are required. Nutrition should be part of the school curriculum. People become fat because they eat too much junk food.