Patrick Costello (Dublin South Central, Green Party)
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I thank the witnesses. I will start by indulging a pet peeve of mine. This is not anything personal because I hear the same language across government but the applicants are not customers. They are applicants and service users. The International Protection Office is not a business. It is a Government Department. We see this language. An Garda Síochána talks about its customers. Customers implies that people engaging with the service have a level of choice. I am not sure any of the people who find themselves on the receiving end of An Garda Síochána feel like they have a choice. Similarly, many of the people coming before the International Protection Office do not really have a choice. It is a language that has seeped into the whole of government and I really feel it is inappropriate. It seems to be the standard language but international protection applicants are not customers and the International Protection Office is not a business. It is a Government Department dealing with applicants for international protection who need to have their rights vindicated. It is a pet peeve of mine.

Putting that aside, one thing we have heard for a long time from people living in direct provision was their sense of being in limbo because decisions were taking so long. Anything we can do to speed up decisions is welcome. The modernisation and all of these things are welcome.

However, when it comes to the vindicating of rights of applicants, efficiency and speed of decision are not necessarily the correct benchmark. Rather, we have to ask if we are actually vindicating those rights. I want to explore this new process from so-called safe countries. A country can be on the safe country list but still be very dangerous for an individual applicant depending on their circumstances. By designating a country as safe, I am concerned that we are undermining individual applications and individual rights. The Department is saying that the new process will be the same and that people will have the same rights, but how is it that they can be decided in three months compared with 22 or 26 months? How can they be decided in three months in comparison with other applications? What shortcuts are being taken? What shortcuts through people's individual rights are being taken, particularly when they are being given less time to appeal and so on?

Robotic and artificial intelligence, AI, processing was mentioned. This leaves me quite ill at ease without seeing further details. In particular, I am concerned at review of robotic or automatic decisions and oversight of these. Robotic decisions can seem to be very fair. If the algorithm that underpins a decision is unfair, then every decision that grows from that will be unfair. We are in an area where there is very little legislation. The EU is acting on this, but how do we ensure the protection of the rights of applicants? I am watching the clock, so I will leave it at that.