FINE Gael county councillor Daniel Butler will move outside his local authority role to help parents educate their children about drugs at an hour long talk in the South Court Hotel on this Thursday, April 10.
According to Cllr Butler, a drug education and prevention worker in the city, education is the key to overcome most health challenges, and drug abuse, he says, is no different. The Limerick City West councillor believes drugs is a word banded around so much these days that people have become “desensitised” by it.
“Life can turn on one decision. A drug is a mood-altering substance that can change the destiny of any of our children like it has for some of our friends from our childhood whether they were legal drugs such as alcohol or illegal drugs such as cannabis. It’s a risk, a gamble. So how can we as parents be prepared?” Cllr Butler asks.
The answer, he reveals, is education.
“As parents we can educate ourselves to understand the different drugs; their effects and some warning signs in our young people. We can educate our son or daughter on drugs and exactly why they are dangerous. We need to avoid hearsay and scaremongering which do not work,” he insists.
Cllr Butler warns that drug use is a “social issue that knows no boundaries in terms of address, economic status, age or race”. And with children as young as eight using drugs it’s an issue that’s not going away.
“I see in my work, particularly in schools, how young people fear drugs but are still tempted into experimenting. Why? As a young person our natural instinct is jump into life in all its shapes with two feet and think later. But with a good, accurate and engaging education we can equip our son or daughter to make a better life choice when we are not there to make it for them,” said Cllr Butler, who has a four-year-old stepdaughter.
He will host ‘Talking to your child about drugs’, a free hour-long talk open to the public in the South Court Hotel this Thursday at 7.30pm.
