Children sent for psychiatric treatment
Senator Devine raised concern that Irish children are being sent to psychiatric institutions in the United Kingdom and condemned the practice as harmful and dislocating.
I second Senator Craughwell's amendment to the Order of Business calling on the Minister for Defence to come to the House.
The headline we have been subjected to, yesterday in particular, is that Irish children are being exported to psychiatric institutions, mainly in the United Kingdom. There were six in the last two years that we know of, three of whom have ended up in St. Andrew's in Northampton, England, for treatment. We need to be very mindful of this. There are two issues.
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We are exporting our children, as we have done in the past. These vulnerable children are being sent away from their families, their friends, their home, their country and, most importantly, their community. What message are we giving them? It is that we do not want to listen. We are sending them to outside institutions, leaving them with no means of communication with family or friends in order to fight their corner, and fighting their corner is of the essence here.
The Channel 4 investigative programme, "Dispatches", in a broadcast entitled "Under Lock and Key", put a spotlight on St. Andrew's in Northampton. The spotlight showed that this institution did not meet the needs of its patients, did not make them better and did not even keep them safe. There has been continuous condemnation of the treatment of children in this institution yet we are sending our children there at whatever cost because we do not have the facilities here that we need, although that is an argument for another day.
I would like the Leader to ask the Minister of State, Deputy Helen McEntee, to come to the House for further debate. Has HIQA or, more importantly, the Mental Health Commission approved these centres, as must be done in this country? It does not seem they could be approved given there is condemnation of all of its practices and, in particular, the practice of control and restraint, which is face-down restraint, which has been banned in this country. It has been used there at least 600 times, it is said, and it is implicated in the deaths of patients. We do not use it yet it is used there and that institution sees no problem with it. We cannot send our children there. I look forward to a debate on this issue.