3 Dads Walking BBC Breakfast Pride of Britain
Now the last time we saw the three dads on breakfast they were marching through westminster completing an epic 600 mile hike around the uk’s four national parliaments uh mike andy and tim walking of course in memory of their daughters who all took their own lives and campaigned for suicide awareness to be taught in schools and tonight viewers of the pride of britain
Awards on itv can watch them receive their award from three sporting legends uh chris robshaw david haye and chris kamara have a look as a new parent i can’t possibly understand the pain you’ve been through but your ability to turn that pain into action is truly heroic i was unaware that uh suicide was the biggest killer of people under 35 didn’t know that till
Tonight just that you know can spark a conversation and the fact what you’re doing in parliament i’m way behind it and um i definitely think this is something that should be implemented in schools just the knowledge of what this actually means if those kids are being affected by it i met these three guys tonight early on aren’t they fantastic they weren’t meant to
Find each other but they have and they’ve made most of it well done all of you congratulations congratulations please give it up for chris chris and david and the all-inspiring winners walking well i’ve very pleased to say all three are here now morning morning and i’m also pleased to say we’re going to the serious stuff in just a moment normal service
Has been resumed the knees are out i barely barely recognize you up on that stage in your suits looking all done up was there a debate about whether you should go up in the in the shorts or not we were told wives told us yeah wife decision go up in your suits uh we’ve got the awards here congratulations thank you um and people can see the awards itself tonight well
What was it like for you surreal really odd i mean it’s odds sitting here meeting you a lot even though we’ve done it several times but to turn up with the dorchester and walk down the red carpet which took like three quarters of an hour isn’t it just really odd really odd you know the fact that we we didn’t choose to to take that route um but we’ve ended up with
These things as a as a recognition of what we’ve been doing there’s just such a about to be a great honor but what a surprise it is a massive surprise i know your daughters will have been in your hearts every moment of that um event and i know i think mike you in particular said beth would would have loved it yeah but beth was born to be on stage anyway and she
Would have loved all the glitz and glamor there but it was very it was a great honor you know it’s a great platform but it’s very bittersweet for us as well you know it’s just part of our journey i think we’ve still got so much more work to do but to be recognized in this way yeah it’s fantastic but you must have had a sense to him of the enormous imbad and how
You have really spoken to people in a way and connected not just people who’ve been affected by suicide but bereaved parents actually it’s just incredible how many people have come and out to us and meet us total strangers and some of them have been really really kind of so sad but so inspiring a dad of an 11 year old who came out although they can cheltenham into
Wales who’d lost his son you know a year before and he just wanted to talk to us and he wasn’t the only one lots of parents of you know young people have taken their own lives and just realizing we’ve got this massive problem across society that we as a bunch of adults need to address the kids are looking at stuff on their phones they’re looking stuff up we need
To own that and be more responsible it’s interesting we heard david hey there didn’t we on stage saying i’ve learned you know i’ve met these guys and made me think i didn’t even know the figures are you hearing that more and more yep well it’s one of those things that until we get thrown into the world of suicide prevention which yeah just happened with the three
Of us happened out of the blue until you get dumped in this uh shattered world you don’t appreciate what’s going on out there and the fact that suicide is the biggest killer of under 35s in the uk and we we as a society are doing booger all about it we’ve got to do something we’ve got to talk about it we as adults need to talk about it you know the fact that we’ve
We’ve got this petition going pointed at the government is is it’s kind of an easy target but it’s not just aimed at the government it’s aimed at everybody everybody should be talking about this because while young people are dying you know up to 200 school children a year are taking their own lives we need to talk about it because we don’t tell them as as we were
Saying there they’ll find out about it through their mobile devices and is that what we want to do we’d let them find out about suicide through the internet rather than a safe and controlled discussion specifically you want it to be included as part of the phsc isn’t it part of the curriculum which in england anyway and obviously to the devolved governments will
Have their own systems for this but what is it that you because charlie and i were talking about this beforehand saying it’s very very sensitive the whole idea of talking about suicide to potentially vulnerable teenagers you don’t know who you’re talking to in a room are you introducing ideas that might not otherwise be there when you talk about it how do you
Manage all of that so the the thing that i find incredible incredibly sad is that papyrus the charity we walk for get called into schools after there’s been a suicide so they’re totally reactive and all we’re saying is let’s put age-appropriate and there is age-appropriate material out there let’s put it in proactively let’s be let’s talk to our kids because if we
Don’t talk about it as and has already said the kids will look for it on the mobile phones and that’s the last thing you want them to do and when you hear of children age is the youngest we’ve heard of and lots of children you know in their 11 12 13 parents we met and all of them have said if the kids have got that help seeking behavior we need to encourage the
Kids to seek help and that’s we’re asking and also for the parent sorry the the teachers as well if a child comes to them to know how to signpost they need additional help they need help we have had various responses to the petition should we go through these first of all this is what the government said that schools can teach older pupils about suicide and the
Relationship sex and health education guidance advises schools to approach the topic carefully being aware of the risks i went on to say the government is committed to reviewing the advice next year with new guidance expect to be published in 2024 and then in response to that you i know have written back to the education secretary we have a new education secretary
Now asking how that would help younger children who are having suicidal thoughts when i mean we’re just seeing that the whole of that exchange there and this is you saying that they’re failing to a quick young people with uh the tools they need i mean i i heard your sort of i don’t know what it was it was sort of a good four you you’re you’re you’re frustrated
Aren’t you well i know the exact word i want to say it begins with b and ends in alex um so i’ll let you work that one out because what we’re talking about is getting it as a compulsory part of the curriculum yeah because if this is what’s killing young people we need to talk to them about it and you’ll see on the response that the government said to us schools
Can talk about it it is not a compulsory so a lot of schools do have done it the water schools are doing it so when you hear that in that statement they’re talking about the review which is due to take place do you do you understand at all the notion that they they can’t governments in the education system can’t react as immediately as you would want i mean there
That that presumably you you do understand but do you think it’s being delayed too long there has to be a procedure of some sort the statements in in their reply says we are doing everything we can basically to prevent suicide they’re not full stop they’re not you know i’d ask every parent as well and anyone who who um who sort of um works with young people or
Anyone to really ask this question themselves and then take this to the government through our petition you know sort of are the young people you know really equipped to deal with their mental health issues you know if they’ve got a lot coming in from all angles now do they have help seeking behavior do they really what happens when you really need to reach out
When they’re struggling can they look after themselves because if the answer is no you need to sign that petition and i don’t believe the government is doing enough do you know whenever you appear on your program i’m delighted you’re here now uh often uh anecdotally people ask me afterwards how are you oh it’s one of those things that always crops up people want
To know you know they seem great amazing what they’re doing and then they say do you think you’re okay do you think all right how’s do you mind me asking because i think we uh baby don’t think about it often no it’s a good question and i know you asked us this last time we were on how are you and when you mean it it’s a really important question to ask and we’re
Okay we’re okay we have our moments yeah without any shadow doubt like any suicide brew parent like anybody who’s suffering from bereavement full stop you have your moments but uh we’re all right and certainly having the three of us uh it’s a very powerful uh support we’ve got yeah i would just like to say you say we are okay but our families struggle through this
You lose you know a daughter through suicide but also betty and sophie and emily they were sisters you know they were nieces they meant so much to so many people the pain just doesn’t go away it spread across those other people as well so you know really are we okay we’re we’re striding on we’re walking but you know life isn’t all rose it is hard but knowing that
We’re doing some good and trying to stop other people going through what we’re going through that’s what it’s all about we can’t net all these young people die every year it’s so needless they’re so talented they make such vast decisions and the the sad fact andy spoke about you know 200 school children around all the young people the parents that we have met i i
Don’t know one that was put down to suicide i know most of them were put down to miss adventure so there’s a whole load of people there that die by their own hand and they don’t go in the statistics uh this is all very very important what you’re saying as you well know did anyone do anything really embarrassing at the awards was it was there a moment when you met
Someone who made some faux pas or anything okay now there’s a thing what goes on in the award stays in the awards off air maybe yeah maybe thinking someone was someone else and um but but they were absolutely lovely about it as well give us a clue give us a clue oh it was strictly orientated let’s say that yeah it was strictly it wasn’t exactly absolutely but
Everyone was fantastic there they were you know all the celebs and everything you know they’ve got a massive reach as well yeah but a lot of them suicide mental health issues don’t discriminate yeah exactly obviously here thank you there are many people by the way who can get away with the kind of language you use i love it but you can you can the daily mirror
Pride of britain awards is on itv tonight at eight o’clock also as we always say if you’ve been affected by the issues raised in this discussion you can find help and support at bbc.co.uk forward slash action line we’re on bbc one until quarter past nine this morning when it’s time for morning live with ot and gethin and they can tell us what they’ve got in store
Morning both well actually good morning i was just asking oti who the who the lads got confused by the pride of britney was you were there was it wasn’t you was it no i’m assuming it’s me i get it all the time me and lucy get confused for each other oh we’ll get to the bottom of the time
Transcribed from video
3 Dads Walking BBC Breakfast Pride of Britain By Ged Flynn