The €9 million the Government will spend on ‘smartphone pouches’ might be better spent on digital education, the ISPCC has said. 

The Government hopes stopping children from using their phone during the school day will boost academic results and improve their mental health. 

On The Anton Savage Show, ISPCC Head of Policy and Public Affairs Fiona Jennings said society has to deal with the fact that smartphones are now “part of children’s lives”. 

“We need to find some way that we can support children and young people to be engaging with these technologies in a healthy and supportive way,” she said. 

“So, having a lockdown until the school bell rings, I would question just how supportive that is. 

“Children are growing up in a digital world, so I would have suggested that a €9 million allocation could perhaps have been put towards better education, supporting children how to self-regulate with these types of devices. 

“Into further education measures as well that are aligned with the curriculum but also that are focused on the world of tomorrow as well, so children are really set up for jobs that haven’t even been created yet.” 

A teenager using an iPhone. Picture by: Alamy.com

Ms Jennings acknowledged the impact that social platforms are having on young people’s wellbeing and suggested the Government should also do more to get big tech to change algorithms that prioritise potentially harmful content. 

“Platforms certainly need to have more pressure put upon them in terms of examining their business model,” she said. 

“Especially around the addictive design nature of the products they’re developing but also the recommender systems within those productions as well that’s pushing those harmful contents in their feeds. 

“Which does absolutely have real world consequences for some children.” 

Body image

Ms Jennings described being a teenager as a “confusing time” and said far too many girls are developing unrealistic expectations about body image. 

“We know from our childline services as well, for the mostly young girls that contact us, it is about those particular pressures that they feel,” she said. 

“The teenage years are already a confusing enough time without this added level to it as well. 

“The pressures they feel to look in a particular way or sometimes act in a particular way, that affects their confidence, their self-esteem.”

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Main image: A teenager using a mobile phone. Picture by: Alamy.com