Una Mullally: The kids are not alright

Last week, the economist Dan O’Brien tweeted an interesting graph from the OECD’s cross-national survey on trust in government and public institutions, which measured 2021 findings from 50,000 responses across 22 countries. The graph pertained to how younger people tend to have lower trust in government.

On average, 36.9 per cent of people aged 18-29 tend to trust government, compared with 45.9 per cent of those aged 50 and over. Trust in government is also gendered. Women trust government 2.7 per cent less than men, on average, across countries. But when it comes to Ireland, trust in government among young people collapses. The only other country in the OECD where young people trust government less than Ireland is Colombia. But what’s even more alarming is the generational gap in trust. The figures are stark. Ireland has the largest generation gap in trust in government in the OECD. Just under 60 per cent of people aged 50 and over in Ireland trust government. But just over 20 per cent of people aged 18-29 in Ireland do. This 40 per cent gap between generations is seismic.

This is the gap that is moving politics, discourse and society so profoundly in Ireland, and yet within this gap is a vacuum. We don’t hear enough about it or from it. We have repeated things like “Ireland has failed its young people” so much, the gravity of that statement has become normalised to a point of lost meaning. And yet we know that the ongoing political earthquake in Ireland that sees Sinn Féin surge in popularity is driven by young people. We know that the new Celtic revival across culture is driven by young people’s enthusiasm for Irish heritage. We know that the social revolution across LGBTQ+ rights and women’s reproductive rights was driven by young people. So why do we keep paying disproportionate attention to demographics that are languishing behind such change, and in some cases even callously dismissing it?

We don’t have enough people between the ages of 18-29 on Irish radio, writing opinion pieces in Irish newspapers, sitting on current affairs panels on television, and certainly not in the Dáil. There is one person in the Dáil within this demographic, James O’Connor, a Fianna Fáil TD elected in Cork-East who was previously an intern for Micheál Martin and Jim O’Callaghan.

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If you’re one of those 18 year olds who doesn’t trust government, you were four years old when the financial crash of 2008 happened. You were 11 when the marriage equality referendum happened. You were 14 when the Eighth Amendment was repealed. And when it comes to opportunities to own a home, or afford rent, a housing crisis is all you’ve ever known. We can also deduce that this collapse in trust, a collapse that will relegate Fine Gael in particular to the margins, is driven by the housing crisis and the failed policies Fine Gael has pursued, policies they have doubled and tripled down on, instead of admitting to themselves that they have failed, that they’re wrong, and that they need to park their chaotic and damaging neoliberal ideology.

I’m in Berlin at the moment, a city I’ve returned to again and again over the past decade. Berlin is full of young Irish people. Sit down in a cafe or a bar, and the likelihood of hearing an Irish accent, in my experience, is almost certain. Restaurants, cinemas, night clubs, art exhibitions, gigs, parks, browsing flea markets, grabbing a kebab, shopping for books – I can’t think of an experience or interaction I’ve had in the city this year where Irish accents haven’t been present.

More than 70 per cent of young people aged 18-24 in Ireland are considering emigrating because they think they would enjoy a better quality of life elsewhere. Unfortunately, they’re right

When I was here on my last trip to the city in spring, myself and my partner were waiting for a table outside a restaurant and were conversing in Irish, giving out about a group who were delaying at our desired table. We didn’t want them to hear us (unfairly) admonishing them, and as plenty of Irish speakers know from travelling, our language can operate as a great private code. Or so we thought. When the waitress emerged to assist us, she smiled, “An bhfuil gach rud ceart go leor?” We were busted, and all had a bit of a laugh about it. When she found us a table, I thought how remarkable it was that there are so many young Irish people in Berlin now that you can actually bump into an Irish-speaking young person, a niche demographic. You encounter those niches only when the Irish population is broad and diverse.

Last week, Red C research for the National Youth Council of Ireland found that more than 70 per cent of young people aged 18-24 in Ireland are considering emigrating because they think they would enjoy a better quality of life elsewhere. Unfortunately, they’re right. Eighty per cent are fearful for the future; 50 per cent report worse mental health in the context of the rising cost of living; 40 per cent are less happy than they were six months ago; and almost 50 per cent say they are struggling to make ends meet. The needs of youth should shape policy. But it won’t under this Government, and young people know that. The trust has been broken, and anyone with foresight can deduce the catalogue of ramifications that will have.