For 17-year-old debate champion Eoin McMahon, the ability to state your case and resolve differences is a crucial life skill.

It's also a pastime that comes naturally to him, and after four years' formal debating the results are showing. Last weekend, Eoin won best senior school speaker for the second year running at the Bermuda Junior Service League Debate Tournament.

Eoin also took top place in the category of extemporaneous speaking when the Saltus team attended last month's International Independent Schools Public Speaking Competition in Ottawa, Canada.

Eoin offers two pieces of advice for anybody afraid of public speaking — which includes himself. "Try to imagine no-one's there. Look at a spot on the wall." And: "Practice."

As Deputy Speaker for Bermuda's Youth Parliament and head boy at Saltus, Eoin uses debating skills all the time, even if just to clarify his own thoughts. He said: "In everyday life, you're always going have to points where you need to present your side and persuade someone, which is what debate is all about.

"On one hand, you have logical argument and on the other you have the persuasive arts."

The results, he said, aren't just a clear view of all sides of a situation, but also the ideal way of reconciling them. "The best way to understand something is to have all the arguments thrown out on the table, and then take it from there."

At this year's National Debate Tournament, the Saltus team included Eoin, Ariella DeSilva and James Mulderig. Eoin took the top number of points with James coming fourth and Ariella fifth.

The annual competition, put on by the Debate Society of Bermuda as well as the Junior Service League, was held at the Berkeley Institute.

It was Eoin's fourth year of participating. The topics covered were 'This House Would Open Casinos in Bermuda' and 'This House Would Make Recycling Mandatory'.

The technique of Eoin's team was to come up with as many points as possible and then research for evidence to support them. He said: "Sometimes you find you have to throw points out. For our first round, we got a copy of the Green Paper on gambling, and for the proposition case it was all we needed.

"Then, as opposition, we based our entire case around two surveys that found, for example, that a lot of tourists were opposed to the introduction of gambling in Bermuda. That was just done through the news sites."

For the impromptu round — on recycling — the team argued successfully for making it mandatory in Bermuda, with one hour's preparation.

Debate has afforded Eoin travel opportunities: the team got to sit in the chairs of the Canadian Senate in Ottawa last month, and travelled to Deerfield, Massachusetts, for last year's public speaking competitions; he also visited Qatar last year as a member of Bermuda's five-member national team, for the World Schools Debate Championship.

Watching fellow competitors in the finals for parliamentary debate in Canada was Eoin's second chance to sit in a Parliamentary building so far. In Bermuda, the Youth Parliament is privileged to sit every Wednesday in the same room of the House of Assembly used by the Island's Parliament.

Eoin called it "a forum where you learn Parliamentary practice and also take in the full spectrum of views.

"We've debated everything from conscription to the Regiment to the insertion of sexual orientation into the Human Rights Act. It's always interesting to see what a range of different people think."

This is his third year at the Youth Parliament; he served last year as the Opposition Speaker.

The only child of Catherine and Thomas McMahon, who hail from County Mayo and County Clare in the Republic of Ireland, Eoin credits his love of debate to heated discussions with his parents as well as a natural gift of the gab.

"I think my parents always knew I'd grow up to be some kind of debater," he said.

He also credits Saltus English teacher and debating coach Christianna Hiles with recruiting him to the national and the school team.

Since then, debating has imbued him with a keen interest in world affairs, and his possible future interests range from journalism to politics.

For now, Eoin's college subject will probably be economics — influenced in part by his mother, who teaches the subject at the Bermuda High School.

From his first public speaking experience at the Debate Tournaments four years ago, he agreed that he's come far but said that he still gets nervous.

"The first few times I did public speaking, I was terrified. Even now my hands shake when I'm talking, no matter how confident I might think that I am. Usually once I sit down again I can't remember what I just said because of the adrenalin."

Practice makes perfect, he added: "You gradually learn to organise your thoughts while you're talking, and rather than having to prepare a speech you can use bullet points and work off those.

"Everyone's nervous at the start. You just get better with time."