Maureen O'Sullivan (Dublin Central, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I have been very struck by the discussion given the comments made recently by a certain councillor about the Traveller community. We do not have to go too far for this type of comment. A huge spectrum of issues has been covered and I will confine myself to a small number of them. Amnesty International works with EU embassies and delegations. The committee meets many ambassadors and I certainly have followed up on cases with individual ambassadors. Is there a role for the committee to raise specific human rights issues when we meet ambassadors? We have a good relationship with the ambassadors from Iran and Kenya. The African ambassadors meet us collectively. We do not have an ambassador from the United States just yet but I presume we will have one. The United States has major questions to answer when it comes to human rights. They are very good at telling other people what to do but they lack in doing it themselves.

I wish to wear my Association of European Parliamentarians for Africa, AWEPA, hat and speak about the human rights of workers. Recently we had an interesting discussion with the Dublin Port Authority which has initiated a programme with ports in certain African countries, particularly in west and east Africa. It involves a training programme with workers in these ports and AWEPA hopes to follow up on it. A recent meeting with a gentleman from Kenya brought home the absolute ruthlessness and unscrupulousness of multinational companies when it comes to land. It is a real David and Goliath issue. They offer an abysmal amount of money for the use of land, the use of which the population is then deprived of, and this has repercussions for food. Fortunately in this particular area the Kenyan community stood together with an NGO and was able to do something about it. I do not think enough is being done with businesses with regard to human rights. Some NGOs work very hard on country-by-country auditing, so something can be done about the massive amounts of tax evasion and tax avoidance.

We have much to answer for when it comes to how we treat migrants. Regardless of how one feels about them being here, the fact is they are here and they are entitled to be treated with dignity. I have friends who work with unaccompanied minors on great integration programmes with schools in the inner city. They work on a pittance and I was appalled recently when I learned of the amount spent on direct provision. Some people are making a great deal of money out of the needs of other people. We must look practically at what can be done. Where is Amnesty International on this?