The Minister for Children at the Department of Health, Mr Frank Fahey, yesterday announced three pilot projects to help teenage parents.
They are aimed at intervention at the ante-natal stage and in the first two years of a child's life, ensuring that problems are identified and dealt with early, and that parenting skills are improved through regular advice and support.
The three-year projects, in Dublin, Cork and Galway, will cost £280,000 in a full year, and will combine the resources of hospitals and community, voluntary and statutory organisations.
About 3,000 babies are born to women under 20 every year. Of these women, only about 100 are married. The marital status of the mothers is not seen as relevant in these projects, and part of the work will centre on involving the babies' fathers.
According to Mr Fahey, the impetus for the projects has come from international research showing that neglect and poor parenting in the first two years of a child's life lay the seeds for behavioural problems and delinquency later.
Both health boards and hospitals report that the children of young parents are over-represented in admissions to hospitals, while a UK report has suggested that children born to teenage mothers start life with specific health risks.
A working group was established under the chairmanship of Ms Rosemary Grant, senior social worker in the Coombe maternity hospital, and includes representatives from other maternity hospitals, voluntary agencies and the Department of Health and Children.
Announcing the projects, Mr Fahey said that many social problems had their roots in the first two years of a child's life. He said social workers in the maternity hospitals had told him they could see the problems as the mothers left the hospitals. Gardai had told him that by the time the children came to their attention at the age of 11 or 12 it was too late to help them.
"I am convinced that if the Government can tackle this problem it will save significant amounts of the money to the Exchequer in the years ahead," he said. He said he was confident of getting funding from the Government for a nationwide programme next year, based on these projects.
Dr Mary Smith, a child psychiatrist from Trinity College, said the consensus among psychologists now was that the roots of loving and learning were laid down in the first couple of years.
If a child developed a good sense of self from the nurturing he or she received from the mother, that child would view the world as non-threatening rather than hostile.
Ms Grant said all members of the group agreed on the need to identify people leaving maternity hospitals who, when they hit a problem with their babies later, were unlikely to have the resources to handle it. It was also intended that the projects would enhance the quality of life of the young parents and their children.