David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The reason was we were anxious to take people from Italy, as I said in my introduction earlier. We had quite a lot of discussion with the previous Minister and Tánaiste, and myself and others at official level had discussions with Italian representatives at all levels, including at ministerial level. We gave a commitment here that we would carry out security checks on people before they came into the country. We did so because we did not want to be in a position whereby if somebody arrived here but something happened and then I would be asked what checks were carried out before they came here. The Italians would not allow us to deploy members of the Garda to their territory to interview people who might come here. We were of the view that we could not bring people from Italy unless we did so. We tried everything to break the impasse but nothing worked. Therefore, we did not spend the money that was allocated to relocate people from Italy to Ireland. That money is unspent. We are trying to use the money for other purposes otherwise we will lose it. This fund is dedicated to relocation.