Dr. Liam Thornton:

I thank Senator Black for her questions. She is absolutely correct in identifying that Ireland only adopted the minimum standard or obligation with the nine-month period under international human rights law Ireland may be before the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination in November or December this year. With other European Union countries, that UN human rights treaty body has stated, six months may be a more appropriate minimum period. As I emphasised in my full submission, perhaps we can go beyond that minimum human rights standard. The EU reception directive does not comply with minimum human rights standards with regard to the delay in accessing work where a first-instance decision is not made.

I absolutely concur with the Senator's analysis that work is so fundamental to human dignity and well-being, perhaps we should consider the degree the people with a negative first-instance decision would be permitted to work while they await the outcome of their appeal before the International Protection Appeals Tribunal. I will not go into the precise details contained in my longer submission but there has been interpretation given to the 2018 reception regulations. It indicates that once people have waited nine months, regardless of whether this was before the 2018 regulations came into force and whether they got a negative decision afterwards and are be awaiting appeal, they should be permitted to work. The decision maker for the International Protection Appeals Tribunal, when she was making a later decision, indicated that felt she had got that wrong so she resiled and stated that she did not want to continue with her incorrect interpretation of law which she might have applied. A significant number of people are still awaiting appeal outcomes having waited for first-instance decisions for well over nine months but they cannot work.

With respect to the likelihood of legal action against the State, we have seen attempted legal action before in a case concerning applicants known as CA and TA. One of the core arguments in the case was that the direct provision system was a violation of the right to private and family life under the Constitution and the European Convention of Human Rights Act 2003. That case failed because Mr. Justice Colm Mac Eochaidh said the applicants, Ms CA and her child, TA, had not provided the requisite legal standard of proof to demonstrate that in the instance, their right to private and family life had been violated. The honourable judge outlined his feeling that direct provision is an exceptionally alien environment for any sort of child to be reared in or even in which to go about one's normal life.