Mark Ward (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome all the witnesses today and thank them for their opening contributions. It was good information for me. I am from Clondalkin and in my area we have - and I use this term lightly - one of the more successful direct provisions centres. When I say successful, I mean successful in relation to how the people and the residents there have integrated into my community. They are part of the local football teams which I manage, and are involved in Tidy Towns. They have really enriched our community and are very welcome. The lads are there for more than a decade now and they came in when we did not have the same level of misinformation, or as was mentioned, the existence of other actors out there spreading hate and disinformation. I am delighted because it goes to show what can happen in communities such as my own. When the centre was being closed down, members of my community went out and rallied behind the people in the direct provision centre to keep them there because its residents were a part of our community. The issues were not at same level as we have now. I meet residents on a regular basis. As I think was mentioned, there are 5,000 people at present who have legal status and a right to remain but they cannot move out of direct provision because of the current housing crisis. What seems to be coming up when speaking to residents is that they feel they are being unduly pressurised to move out of direct provision and into homeless accommodation. I will not mention the name but will give the example of one person who received the right to remain status in the past year. That person was successful in getting onto the local authority list. You would think that when you get the right to remain, things would get better. Actually, this person feels that things have got worse because they feel they are being put under undue pressure to go into homeless accommodation. Are the witnesses aware of this happening in other direct provision centres across the State? What advice can I give to these people when they are facing these pressures?