Charlie O'Connor (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
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Question 83: To ask the Minister for Health and Children if she will report on the meeting between her Department and Members of the Northern Ireland Assembly in respect of suicide; if new initiatives are being planned following this meeting; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [8573/08]

Jimmy Devins (Sligo-North Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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The Northern Ireland Health Committee is currently undertaking an inquiry into the prevention of suicide and self harm in Northern Ireland. As part of that inquiry I met with the Committee on 21 February. The purpose of the meeting was to look at the scope and level of cross border cooperation and learn of progress in implementing 'Reach Out' the National Strategy for Action on Suicide Prevention 2005 — 2014.

During the meeting it was acknowledged that significant cooperation exists on suicide prevention. Implementation of the All Island Action Plan for Suicide Prevention is on-going and substantial progress has been made on a number of action areas including; joint launch of an awareness campaign in October 2007 (North and South), launch of the Deliberate Self Harm Registry on an all island basis and joint sponsorship of the successful International Association of Suicide Prevention Conference in Killarney in August 2007; training in Safe Talk, an intervention programme (a shortened version of ASIST Training (Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training) has taken place North and South and the development of media guidelines.

In addition, there is reciprocal north-south membership on the respective implementation groups for the strategies in Northern Ireland Protect Life-A Shared Vision (2006) and in the Republic of Ireland Reach Out (2005).

It was agreed that there is scope for development of the existing plan and that reducing suicide requires a collective effort. I look forward to seeing the findings of the Committee's Inquiry.