Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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I thank the Deputy. The scorecard from the Children's Rights Alliance clearly indicates the real challenges we have faced in this area in the past year. The landscape has entirely changed from what it was in late 2021, for example, when we undertook the serious and still challenging task of ending direct provision by the end of 2024. We were dealing with accommodating and meeting the accommodation needs of 7,500 people with an expectation of 3,500 to 4,000 people arriving per year. As the Deputy will be aware, 15,000 people arrived in 2022 and we are now accommodating a total number of 20,000 people. Therefore, 2022 was a year of responsiveness in a crisis rather than one of undertaking the longer term reform we all would have liked to undertake.

Nevertheless we want to undertake longer term reform. I am acutely aware that children are the most vulnerable people in the international protection process. We are examining the use of an improved child payment for those seeking international protection. As the Deputy is aware, adults and children seeking international protection receive a payment of €38 per week for an adult and €30 per child. It is a very small payment. Recognising the risk of poverty faced by children generally but specifically those in the international protection system, we will be looking at that in 2023.

HIQA will begin to undertake inspections of international protection accommodation this year. We have reached an agreement with the agency. It has designed criteria against which it will be monitoring international protection accommodation. It will be rolled out over the course of this year. That will be a positive step. HIQA involvement will provide significant expertise and a level of assurance .

I and my Department are engaging with Government colleagues on setting up an agency. It is needed to create a system through which we can meet the needs of more people in our migration system. We all have to accept that the 15,000 people seeking international protection was not a blip. The low numbers of 2,500 or 3,000 people we have seen in the past are likely to remain in the past. I think in future we are likely to see significantly higher numbers of people seeking international protection. The past year has shown that one Department alone cannot deal with both the immediate accommodation needs and the wider integration supports. It is not possible. Some kind of body is needed, whether it is an office or an agency. Thinking of our response to Covid-19, it was led by the Department of Health but the Department had the tens of thousands of staff in the HSE to implement actions. My Department does not have an agency or body to take action on the accommodation and integration needs. Something along those lines should be brought forward. That commitment was not in the programme for Government but we must respond to the changed landscape we spoke about earlier.