James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)

I thank all the witnesses for attending. Like many of the other speakers, I want to express at the outset my sorrow for the young girl who has been the subject of an alleged sexual assault, and to the Ukrainian who has lost his life. It is important to emphasise that both of these children, one of whom is dead and the other who is alleged to have been sexually assaulted, were in the care of the State. There is no avoiding or evading that responsibility. The efforts, essentially, of people to gather outside Citywest in my view is an effort to dehumanise those acts. It is to perpetuate the othering. We should constantly remember the victims at the coalface of all this, while at the same time hold to account in the Committee of Public Accounts the State's obligation to these human beings and what they have suffered. It is really important to emphasise that because no efforts to dehumanise what took place should get any truck from any politician, and we should stand four square behind our gardaí in the efforts they are making to keep communities safe.

I am going to continue the line of questioning in relation to the IPAS system. In the previous Government, a decision was taken to separate the accommodation of international applicants from the decision-making in respect of international applicants. Did that cause a dysfunction in the system as it relates to international applicants?