John Paul Phelan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

There are a couple of things on which I have specific questions. Mr. Collins referred in his opening comments to HIQA. I missed the context in which he referred to HIQA inspections being required. I ask the Migrant Rights Centre Ireland specifically about an issue that has come up in my own constituency work in the past few months. I represent Carlow and Kilkenny. I have come across families who came to work in Ireland with work permits.

They are experiencing grave economic difficulties because their children want to go to third level but they are regarded as overseas students. As a result, they are having to pay full fees. It is one of those issues that until it was brought to my attention, I had not given much thought to. Have our guests encountered this issue? Has any lobbying been done with the higher education sector or with departmental officials in relation to trying to clear up that anomaly? In most cases we are talking about families that have been here for many years and about children who have spent most of their lives living in Ireland.

I also wanted to ask Ms Muperi or Mr. Hambakachere about the engagement that they may or may not have had with local communities. We are all very familiar with some of the right wing stuff and the protests that have happened recently. Mr. Collins referenced in his opening remarks that direct provision has been in Ireland for 20 years. One of the first centres was opened in my own area and there was a feeling at the time that there was no interaction with anybody. The centre arrived and there were no wraparound services but that was 20 years ago. Have we moved on from that? What level of engagement do our guests have in their daily work with local communities? What I find is that the majority of people who are protesting or who have issues are not racist. The issue is a lack of information. They are being used by people who have an ulterior motive. As with everything, when a vacuum exists, people will fill it and some of the people who have come in from across the Irish Sea and other places to stir up hate are doing just that and are able to do so because of a lack of knowledge.

In my own area in Kilkenny, a new centre was opened in the last week. No information of any description was given to public representatives until literally the day before it was due to happen. There is a sense among local communities of a fear of the unknown. It is a failure of the political system, not of our guests, that we have not really adapted our migration policy in Ireland to cope with larger numbers, even leaving aside the fact that the numbers have really spiralled in the last 12 months or more, for obvious reasons.