Dublin director wins international award for documentary about Finglas boy (12) who died by suicide

Alan Bradley received a Gold Award at the YDA Young Director’s Awards in Cannes last week for his RTÉ documentary ‘Patrick: A Young Traveller Lost’, which sheds light on the high suicide rates within the Traveller community.

A jury of distinguished industry producers and directors selected his documentary as the winner from an all-time high number of global submissions.

“It’s exclusively Traveller voices in the film and it provides a space for communities to tell their own story,” Mr Bradley told the Irish Independent.

“The main story is about Patrick McDonagh from Finglas, who sadly was 12 years old when he died by suicide.

“It rang alarm bells throughout the entire community because of Patrick’s young age. It was a devastating loss. It is heavy and it was a hard film to make, Patrick had only passed away a year previous.

“It was still very raw and fresh for the grieving family. His mum and dad, Pat and Michelle, share Patrick’s story, how they’re moving through their grief.

“They shared the message of reaching out for help. It doesn’t need to be this way, if you just reach out and talk, things can get better.

“That was hard, but in a way, it was positive as well, because it allowed a space for them to remember Patrick, to talk about him. When something is so sad, often people don’t talk to you about it because they don’t want to upset you.

“Pat and Michelle used his story for something positive, that was their big driving force, that it wouldn’t happen to another family. That’s why they wanted to share the story.

“A big thing that came out from the conversations was the discrimination levels being huge. Around 80pc of Irish people in the survey said they wouldn’t have a Traveller as a friend. What world does that create for somebody like Patrick trying to navigate his future?

“That lack of ability to access the workforce, access employment, just to have hope for your future. It’s a struggle, it’s a real barrier in having hope for your life going forward. It’s really hard for the Traveller community to get on and get ahead in Ireland.”

The documentary also explores the wider challenges facing their community which Mr Bradley learned about when he attended a talk in Kells, Co Meath.

“I went to a talk at the Hinterland Festival that was about the different challenges based on the Travelling community and I was shocked,” he said.

“I didn’t really know about the many issues facing the Travelling community. The suicide rate shocked me. It’s nine times the national average.

“Every single person I talked to had lost multiple family members. I talked to Mags Casey, who’s an outreach worker, and she’s lost 28 or 29 members of her family from suicide.

“We feature Bernie Power from Kilkenny. He is a young Traveller in his 30s who would have experienced addiction and he was suicidal. Luckily, he did reach out for help and he’s in a much better place now.”

Mr Bradley is currently working on two new documentaries to be broadcast this Autumn. Patrick: A Young Traveller Lost, is available to watch on the RTÉ player