Mental Health Bill 2024: From the Seanad
Dail Éireann — 2026-04-29
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Mary Butler (FF), Waterford

I will conclude with one other point. The Bill does not legislate for or against child admissions. This is important. It was the reason I felt in the Seanad that if I included an amendment that said a child cannot be retained for more than 72 hours after an admission, we were nearly saying it was okay to do this. I do not want to see that happening at all.
In 2008, there were 247 admissions to adult units. As I said, this was reduced to five last year, which was six nights. We have to commend the staff working at the coalface who have done everything they can. Children are admitted to adult units only after efforts to place them in a child and adolescent inpatient unit are unsuccessful due to capacity or clinical need, depending on the situation. It can be very difficult for a child, for example, living in Donegal having to go to Galway, a child living in the midlands having to go to Dublin, a child in Waterford having to go to Cork or a child from Kerry having to go into Cork. This is the reality of the situation.
We must realise, however, that the majority of supports for our young people are provided in the community, regardless of their mental health illness. For example, 95% of all eating disorder supports are provided in the community. We have seen such a surge in those figures since Covid. We do have to accept and acknowledge that these are unique cases. In a unique case, when there is a really difficult decision for a clinician to make, we have to take life over death. I say it every time. We have no choice. It is for that reason, and that reason only. I do believe that we will get to a stage very soon where we will not have any child admissions. Nobody wants to see these admissions happening.
This is what I spoke about at the start. When this Bill is enacted, a 16- or 17-year-old will be able to make decisions in relation to their mental health. Being involuntarily detained at 16 or 17, however, is different. In every single case where this was done, and it was the same the year before, it was undertaken with the support of the family and the young person knew what was happening and it was for a short time. That is the reason I feel so strongly about this aspect.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-04-29/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-21T01:01:08+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-04-29