Mr. Joe Mason:

On the practical side, our first ask is for a bigger, more conjoined and concerted effort from the State to respond in a more proactive rather than reactive way in terms of bringing people experiencing difficulties to Ireland. What we are asking for is for us to learn from our experience and from the pitfalls we have come across. In some ways, we should thank God for a little naivety because if we knew how immense the process would be, we may have thought twice about it. Thankfully, we did not. I thank God for a little bit of naivety. I also thank God that we have a phrase in WALK which is that excellence can be the enemy of good. While we wait to have an excellent plan, people who need a good plan might be dying. We did not decide to wait for an excellent plan. We decided we had a good plan and we continue building on that good plan on the journey. What we need is a team of people to come together and to look at the transport issues, to make it available and workable and to get it on the road quickly. If we cannot find it here, we need a fund to purchase it elsewhere and get it to the border. We need people who are dedicated and committed. Those people are around; we know that. I had myriad volunteers; people jumped out of the woodwork who I would not have considered. They made phone calls and sent emails and text messages looking to volunteer. A myriad of people are willing to get involved in anything that we do.

On the congregated settings, we have to be real here. It is not a million years ago that these institutions were decongregated, so they are probably still relatively habitable. We are only coming out of that process. We still have a significant number of people in institutional care in the State. That accommodation is available. We need to figure out what else we, as an organisation, can do and what we, as a sector, should be doing. Like most people, I imagine, I am a bit of a technophobe and can probably just about navigate Facebook. I still have to ask my son, "What do I do now, son?". However, I am on many fora for Irish people looking to support people from Ukraine, and people from Ukraine who are coming to Ireland looking for support. One of the things that is clear is that people want to come here and not be reliant on the State. People want to work. Many people who have come here have worked in care settings in Ukraine. That is very clear.

People will have noticed that in the past few days, the HSE has been advertising for expressions of interest from people from Ukraine to go into the social care system. I run an organisation and I know that we have a massive shortage of social care staff in the State. We do not value them enough and we have a massive problem here. However, we have this cohort of people coming in who will not have the language difficulties. They will need supports themselves but those supports are different from the supports they are capable of offering to people while they are living in our institutions.

We need to remember they are here because they have to be and not because they want to be. I have yet to meet a Ukrainian person who does not want to go home. It is temporary. It is safe harbour. When we are looking for a safe harbour, we do not care whether it is Bray, Blackpool or Dún Laoghaire. There are practical steps, the first of which is to settle the group of people who understand that excellence is the enemy of the good.