I have been looking around for a solution that implements this, but google always gives me tutorials on establishing a live chat over an ssh tunnel--not the other way around. I suspect this can be implemented just using tunnels (if it is possible at all), but I am not sure how.
I am sorry if this has been asked, but after looking through the related questions, but I have not been able to find one that I can be sure will work for my particular needs (i.e. I cannot create an ssh session directly with gmail.com etc.) If I am wrong, please just post a link to the applicable question.
If you can establish connections between peers via your IRC channel, then there is a solution.
Your data going via IRC will be safe, because ssh is.