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

At certain times we have many people in the protection system looking for protection and at other times the number can reduce. We do not want to have centres that are closed and not needed. There is flexibility in what we are doing at the moment. I take the Senator's point. We are exploring how we might use State-owned facilities and augment those to provide more and better accommodation for asylum seekers. At the moment it is done by way of competitive tender. We are anxious to ensure that there is value for the State and that it does not cost too much while, at the same time, ensuring the standards are high. That is the challenge.

We watch standards closely to ensure the standards in the centres are as high as we can get them. We need to ensure that somebody looking for international protection has accommodation and will not end up on the streets as happened with people who came to Ireland seeking asylum in the 1990s. That is not happening at the moment.