TDs and senators to receive mental health counselling

TDs, senators, and their staff are to get mental health counselling to help them handle stress from their work brought on by the financial crisis in recent years.

Oireachtas officials have responded to an appeal by Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams for support, after he said Britain’s House of Commons offers politicians resources for mental health services. Training and advice is being arranged for members and their staff by See Change, a network of organisations which promotes mental health.

Mr Adams originally appealed last year to Peter Finnegan, acting secretary general of the Houses of the Oireachtas, for the support services. The Oireachtas Committee on Administration wrote to the Louth TD in recent days, announcing planned workshops for TDs, senators and their staff.

The committee noted that “due to the strained circumstances wrought by the financial crisis over the last few years; both the members and their staff in constituency offices were experiencing not alone stress and pressure in their work, but that members of the public were suffering from stress, depression and even mental health issues for which deputies and their staff were ill equipped to deal with”.

Concern had been raised about the difficulty that politicians had in accessing mental health treatment since the only option for most is to access services locally in their constituency, with TDs and senators often reluctant to engage due to the “societal stigma”.

Mental health services in the main could only be accessed by going through a GP, it was pointed out.

Mr Adams had told the Oireachtas Committee that the House of Commons in Britain had recently provided €25,000 towards mental health services for its members. Counselling was already available for Irish civil servants who are employees of the Oireachtas, he said, but this support did not extent to Irish politicians or their staff.

The Oireachtas Committee on Administration has now told Mr Adams of mental health workshops, as part of planned training for politicians and their staff.

The mental health of TDs or senators was put in the spotlight after the suicide of Shane McEntee, the late junior agriculture minister, in December 2012. There were calls then for more support services for politicians, after claims emerged that Mr McEntee had faced pressure from his Dáil work as well as harassment online.

Derek Keating, a Fine Gael Dublin TD, has also recently said he spent periods in psychiatric care last year as a result of work-related stress.

The Oireachtas committee looking at support for politicians originally considered setting up a special helpline where politicians or their staff could access assistance, but this has been left undecided. Instead, the new mental health services for TDs and senators will be kept under review, Mr Adams has been told.