Fine Gael Dun Laoghaire TD, Mary Mitchell O’Connor, has today (Monday) called for schools to implement cyber-bullying policies to deal with students who are tormenting others online. Deputy Mitchell O’Connor was speaking after a new campaign was launched to increase awareness about the issue.

“Cyber-bullying is a growing problem with an ever increasing number of young schoolchildren having access to the internet through their mobile phones. The 24-hour nature of social networking sites like Facebook means that children can be persecuted by their bullies on a constant basis. It is incumbent on both parents and schools to take a proactive approach in tackling this very damaging problem.

“First and foremost, schools need to look at implementing cyber-bullying policies. Students cannot be allowed to bully one another online or elsewhere. However, at present, this is a very difficult situation for schools to address. They face a legal grey area about what action can be taken against students found to be cyber-bullying outside of school time.

“While the law protects adults against various types of discrimination and abuse at the workplace under a variety of labour laws, the same cannot be said for school children. New legislation may be necessary to fully address this problem; we cannot allow our children to be bullied on online forums with no repercussions for their persecutors.

“Many parents may be completely unaware that their child is being bullied; according to the campaign group Bully4u, children won’t tell their parents they are being bullied for fear that their mobile phones and internet access will be taken from them. I would urge parents to check their children’s personal pages on social networking sites; you need to be clued in to what your children are doing online if you want to spot any problems.

“We can only expect this problem to increase in the coming years, as more and more young people switch to smart phones and tablets as their main sources of communication. Huge numbers of our primary school children have mobiles with internet access; we need to ensure the safeguards are in place to adequately protect them from bullies and predators in the online world.”