Ms Edel McGinley:

I thank the committee for inviting us to the meeting today. I am accompanied by Ms Sancha Magat, who is the Migrant Rights Centre Ireland, MRCI, drop-in centre co-ordinator.

For 20 years, MRCI has been working with migrant workers in precarious and low-wage sectors of the labour market, across agrifood, fisheries, home care, domestic work, car washes, entertainment, cleaning and restaurants. In 2020, we provided information, support and advocacy in 3,442 cases. One third of the people who come to our services are undocumented. How a person enters the country and the person's corresponding immigration status determine the person's rights and entitlements in the State and mediate the person's experiences. This includes how people experience State and social services and receive supports. Many people who access our services are in situations of vulnerability due to their immigration status, the type of employment permit they hold, poor conditions of employment, their housing situation and their family and personal circumstances. These are compounded by delays in immigration processing, problems changing employer, delays renewing employment permits, the habitual residence condition, limits to family reunion, being a victim of trafficking for labour exploitation, domestic violence, lack of access to State supports including sick pay and housing and homelessness support, isolation and numerous other issues including discrimination and racism.

I will set out a number of priorities. It is not an exhaustive list because it is a far-reaching topic. We are happy to take questions on this. Through our experience with workers in the agrifood and meat processing sectors we found there is massive experience of exploitation, bullying, harassment, discrimination and health and safety issues. This is compounded by low levels of training by employers, lack of access to information and supports, vulnerability of being on employment permits and language limitations. Injuries at work go unreported due to the lack of sick pay schemes or State supports. People simply cannot afford to be sick and therefore do not engage with the State. In one's first year in this country one is not entitled to sick pay, so for the first year there is no engagement with the State, particularly for people from non-EEA countries. Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic there were very difficult circumstances, especially for meat factory workers. There were problems with contact tracing and following up in a language people could understand, so there were more outbreaks than necessary.

Regarding the employment permit system, there is currently a renewed demand for essential workers on employment permits. A number of jobs have been removed from the ineligible list in healthcare and construction and there are new quotas in meat processing and horticulture. The system limits mobility and people are afraid to speak out for fear of bullying and harassment. They continue to be tied to one employer. Putting rights in the hands of workers, which allows people to have control over their lives, is something we would like this committee to support, particularly the Employment Permits (Consolidation and Amendment) Bill 2020 to give gradual mobility to workers after two years, an immediate right to family reunion and the right to work for spouses and dependants, similar to the rights of critical skills workers.

As regards undocumented children, being undocumented impacts on people's ability to access child benefit due to the habitual residence condition. There are also long-term impacts on children in terms of accessing school and education and on their long-term needs. It is important to recognise and welcome the incoming regularisation scheme due to be announced shortly. However, we believe it is vital that as many children of undocumented families as possible are included in this. It is something we will be asking the committee to support.

During the pandemic there was an approach where firewalls were introduced between Departments so that no data were shared if an undocumented person came forward. It was a very welcome development between Departments. It meant it gave confidence to people to access services. We would like to see this retained and then expanded to the labour inspectorate and across all State services. Undocumented people do not have access to the Workplace Relations Commission, WRC. This is a real infringement on workers' rights. The legislation must be amended to ensure all workers have access to these bodies.

With regard to victims of domestic violence, our service sees many people who continue to face barriers in accessing services.

Recently, the Department of Justice introduced measures allowing people to retain their status, but those are only applicable to spouses registered as dependants and only under certain conditions. Undocumented people who are victims of domestic violence have little access to shelters, refuges or emergency accommodation. There is a lack of comprehensive policy or legislation in this area.

There is a lack of quality interpretation and translation services across all State services. Currently, there is no accredited training course for interpreters, no accreditation system to establish whether interpreters are competent and no system of control to monitor interpreting. In industries where migrant workers have limited language proficiency and they account for the majority of the labour force, State inspections are often carried out with no language provision. This means that Health and Safety Authority or labour inspectors go into a workplace but no one is able to interpret or understand what is happening. In addition, there is inadequate implementation of language provision across public services. This approach has resulted in people who are victims of crime or who have experienced exploitation finding public sector workers such as gardaí, healthcare workers and community workers as cold, indifferent or disrespectful, which further marginalises people. Obviously, public service workers do their best in very limited circumstances, which can be frustrating for them all.

We would make a number of recommendations. We urge the committee to write to the Minister for Justice urgently to ensure that the upcoming regularisation scheme is broad and inclusive and reduces some of the qualifying criteria for children and families to access it. The scheme is imminent in the next week or so. We urge the committee to write to the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment in support of giving mobility to workers after two years and to ask him to consider the upcoming sick pay legislation in order to enable workers to benefit from it effectively. As matters stand, it is not clear that people will. We recommend the introduction and maintenance of firewalls and that all front-line staff be provided with the tools to deliver quality services, including access to quality interpretation, and training on bias and anti-racism. We recommend that delays in renewals of immigration status be addressed, that independent status for all victims of domestic violence be ensured, that State accreditation and a quality control system for interpreters be developed and that resources be provided to organisations like the ones at this meeting so as to ensure that their services are quality and can deliver for people.

We welcome members' questions.