Mayo teen takes to Helix stage for Child Talks 2023

Eoin Murphy from Foxford was one of six young speakers to take to the stage at The Helix in Dublin for Child Talks 2023, the annual World Children’s Day event hosted by the Ombudsman for Children’s Office.

Almost 1,000 schoolchildren from Kildare, Dublin, Wicklow, Cork, Westmeath, Mayo, Roscommon and Meath attended Child Talks 2023, now in its sixth year.

This year’s speakers ranged in age from 10 to 17 years, and their chosen topics included mental health, being LGBTQ+ in Ireland, vaping, neurodiversity in schools, and access to STEM subjects for girls.

Presented by Mark the Science Guy and past speaker Sophia Mulvany, there was also live entertainment from special guests Matilda’s Alisha Weir and singer Michael Moloney, the Mayo native who shot to fame on The Late Late Toy Show.

The show, held on November 7, featured a DJ set from Music Generation and was live streamed at oco.ie, with schools from across the country logging in to watch online. TikTok creator India Sacha was behind the scenes for the event.

Children from across Ireland applied to take part in Child Talks. Over the past number of months, the Ombudsman for Children’s Office, with the support of Dublin Story Slam, worked with the young people involved to help them tell their story.

For his talk, Eoin (16) spoke about the importance of self-love and looking after your mental health.

He stated: “I've known about Child Talks for a number of years now but something about the topic of this year which is ‘The Ireland I want to live in’ really gave me the courage to sign up, as we need change in this country.

“Mental health and equality needs to be more talked about. We definitely have come a long journey as a country on talking about sensitive topics such as this but we need to go further.”

The Ombudsman for Children, Dr. Niall Muldoon, commented: “Child Talks has been running for six years now and is going from strength to strength. We’ve had so many brave and passionate young people tell their stories over the past few years and this year is no different.

“Hearing from children on the issues that matter to them is an integral part of the work of our office and we were delighted to provide this platform to young people again this year.”

Child Talks 2023 is available to watch back online at oco.ie.