Annie Hoey (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I will talk briefly about two different things. I am not aware if Members saw in the news that a Dublin play therapy programme will be extended in the Ballymun area. This is to help children to deal with the impacts of homelessness. It is very important that this is happening and that it is for children who are struggling at school due to their situation. I will give some context here as to how it works. The students are identified, communication is made with the child’s parents and a play therapist is then brought in to help that student.

This is a very damning insight as to where we are as a country that we have to bring play therapists into schools to help children process the negative emotions and impact which being homeless is having on such children. While I applaud that this programme is being brought in; where are we at to have arrived at the situation where children are struggling at school or reverting into themselves or acting out? One of the teachers described how the children are becoming emotionally numb or there is a sense of emptiness, almost like a paralysis, where children are hunched over, with slow movements and eyes cast downwards and where they are very much struggling. That is really awful and I am not even sure where I want to go with this contribution or whether I even want to call for a debate on homelessness, as I do not know what we have to do. It is important, however, to put on record the impact homelessness is having. This is particularly the case in Ballymun, the area in which I am based, where 250 children have been identified who are being directly or indirectly affected by homelessness and where 300 children have been identified as needing play therapy. That is a very poor insight into the state of play we have in Ireland. As I have said, I am unsure exactly what it is or what I am calling for but it is important for me to put this on the record.

Briefly, my second issue, which I will mention briefly, is, of course, my favourite student nurses and midwives issue. The McHugh report, which was accepted by the Minister for Health last year, was supposed to be in place by September. It is now mid-December, it has not been implemented and those student nurses have been without the supports which were promised to them. We have had many debates, discussions, motions and legislation in both Houses discussing student nurses and midwives and the support which should be made available to them and I cannot understand how, when we have a Minister for Health who has agreed and accepted the recommendations from the McHugh report and has promised that they would be in place by September, that they are not there. We wonder then about the figures which are coming out from the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, INMO, on the number of student nurses who are planning to emigrate and not staying here. I wish to put that on the record. Perhaps Members could write from this House to the Minister for Health and ask when the McHugh report will be implemented and when will those student nurses and midwives get the support they so desperately need and have been promised.