Fiona O'Loughlin (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

There is one woman on my mind this morning. Indeed, she has been on my mind all night since I saw her last night on "Prime Time". Anybody who saw and heard Geraldine Mullan from Moville in Donegal either last night or this morning could not have been but so incredibly moved by her loss, grief and sense of dignity and the very strong message she wanted to give to everybody. Geraldine lost her husband and two children on 20 August in a car accident and is now all alone with no family. The message she sent out last night was to cherish those close to us and ensure that we take the time and opportunity to tell them we love them because we never know if we will have that chance again. It is a very strong and significant message from a wonderful woman who is going through the most horrific grief.

I wish to raise the announcement by the Minister for Defence regarding the Defence Forces' commission, which is very welcome. It was in the programme for Government and was part of my party's manifesto. We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to dig deep and get things right. This commission will examine where the Defence Forces will go from here. I have a concern that the scope is limited. It is wrong that the Department of Defence is not mentioned because it is the entity with the money and power, puts in policy in place and has the Government's issues. We have an opportunity to try to get this right so the fact that the Department will not be included is wrong. We should ask the Minister for Defence to come to the House for a debate on that.

An issue that came to my attention during the week is youth mental health in my county. It is a problem around the country but the scale of need in Kildare is not reflected in resource allocation. County Kildare has the highest number of young people in the State at 36.6%. When we compare that with the total population of our neighbouring counties - Offaly and Carlow - we can see that Kildare has a larger population. The problem is that in six of our towns, young people must wait between eight and 12 months for some type of counselling. This is shocking when we look at the statistics relating to levels of mental stress and suicides among young people. I reiterate my previous call for a Jigsaw service to be established in Kildare.