Róisín Garvey (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire go dtí an Teach. I commend her on all the work she has done to date on this. I commend the Fine Gael party on bringing forward this motion. It is a very serious matter of mental health and social health.

The phone has taken over many people's lives. Many parents are not even sure how to manoeuvre them and control what appears on the phone, not to mention what appears on their children's phone. That is probably one of the biggest issues in some ways because giving a smartphone as a confirmation present is common all over Ireland now. The parents do not know how to set up firewalls and even when they think they have set them up, they are not sufficient. I know of many instances of parents thinking they have done everything they could possibly do and then all of a sudden, their child has been exposed to something the parents were sure they had blocked the child from accessing. Therefore, we have a huge issue with mobile phones. Teenagers themselves, although they love their phones, would love safe spaces where they do not have to use them.

It is really important that the Minister for Education said there should not be phone use in primary schools. I do, however, feel really worried about secondary school phone use. Many students still have them on their person in classrooms and some schools even let them use the phone to take photographs or use Microsoft Teams. I know of other schools that have a box at the top of the classroom into which phones have to go so people do not have them on their person when they are in the classroom. They still have access to them outside of the classroom. However, what we see is that some schools have tablets they can use for Microsoft teams, but not all schools have tablets. It is such a huge concern.

I call on the Minister for Education to put a circular out to secondary schools stating there should no longer be any use of phones as a learning tool in the classroom. We all know that once people have the phone in their hand, the temptation is too strong to only use it for classroom work. Once the phone is on their person, they cannot resist scrolling or looking for other things besides the classroom work. It is a big distraction in the classroom. We really need to move away from allowing any phones. If it needs to be that the Minister has to buy a tablet for every student in the country, it would still be much cheaper than the amount of money we are spending on mental health issues for young people in Ireland.

I will quote a few statistics from a recent report, which states that: "93% of eight- to 12-year-olds [now] own a personal smart ...[phone]." The ownership age seems to get younger and younger every year; "84% of them have their own social media ... or instant messaging account." The top four are YouTube, WhatsApp, TikTok and Snapchat; "33% of children gamed with strangers online." Children between the ages of eight and 12 are gaming online with strangers, while "26% have seen or experienced something online in the last year that 'bothered' them [in one way or another]. 31% of them kept it to themselves." We have this huge cohort of children going around feeling guilty because of something they have been exposed to on a phone. The report states, "100% of 12-16-year-olds own a ... [phone]" and "40% have experienced bullying online." Nearly half of children have experienced bullying because of this device. That kind of bullying is so intangible. Teachers might pick up bullying in the classroom or playground, but that is an unseen and intangible form of bullying that is much more worrying than anything that teachers might pick up on. The report continues, "43% of girls have been bullied compared to 30% of boys and 74% identifying as non-binary. 46% of boys, 28% of girls and 64% identifying as non-binary kept it to themselves [when they experienced bullying on the phone]"; "26% have seen or experienced something online that 'bothered' them. 40% did not tell anyone ... [else]." We see that the older they get, the more they hide, and "40% reported that they post videos of themselves online, 83% of which used TikTok to do so."

Of the teachers, then, "74% of teachers told us that online safety was a significant issue in their school." It is not just the teachers. I had the Irish guidance counsellors association in here and we brought up the issue of phone use in secondary schools when we had a meeting with the Minister, Deputy Foley. The guidance counsellors have students coming to them every day with issues around being bullied because of the phone and being on the phone while they are in the classroom. To continue, "45% of teachers feel they don't have sufficient knowledge/skills to effectively deliver online safety educational messages." We have much work to do on this. If we do not have the education piece in schools, which is where young people spend most of their time, we are fighting a losing battle. No matter what other legislation we bring in, we have to up our game with regard to protecting children in the place they spend most time, which is in secondary schools.

Social Media and Youth Mental Health: The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory report states, "... there are ample indicators that social media can also have a profound risk of harm to the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents." It goes on to state that, "Despite this widespread use among children and adolescents, robust independent safety analyses on the impact of social media on youth have not yet been conducted." We have much work to do.

The work the Minister has done to date, and it is the first time it has ever been handled properly by any Minister, is really important. The Online Safety and Media Regulation Act the Minister enacted in 2022 will have a huge effect. I am looking forward to the publication of a revised draft in the coming weeks, with the intent being to adopt a final code later this year. The sooner, the better in that instance. The draft code will set out how platforms must operate effective risk mitigation measures with regard to profit-profiling algorithms and age-appropriate recommendations. I know from speaking with social care workers who do work around parenting courses on phones that the majority of parents are not coming to the courses. We have to educate the young people themselves on the dangers of phones. We have to take the phones away from them. We have to stop this complete free-for-all phone use in classrooms all over Ireland. Teenagers want that. They want that rule and for it to be adhered to. They feel safer if nobody has it. We have much work to do. I commend the Minister on the work she is doing. I commend this Private Members' business. We have a lot more work to do. We could spend all day in the Seanad discussing this huge issue. The single most important issue at the moment is probably mobile phone use among our young people. Of course, we should all use our own less as well.