Mr. Justin Kelly:

Just to add to what the Commissioner said, we work closely with the PSNI and the immigration authorities in the UK. We have a member of An Garda Síochána permanently based in Belfast working only on the protection of the common travel area. Causeway, a UK multi-agency group based in Liverpool, does work around the common travel area. The Garda will send over a dedicated officer to work with that as well. For us, interaction with the PSNI and the UK immigration Border Force happens on a daily basis.

We have had successful prosecutions of people who are facilitating this. As the Senator well knows, there are people organising this, paying the taxi men and all that sort of stuff to get people across the Border and try to get around the protections we put in place for the common travel area. They are complex investigations but we have investigated and prosecuted people. We will continue to do that. As the Commissioner said, that flow across the Border can change. As the Senator again well knows, a number of years ago it was going the other direction. People were flying into Dublin, going to Northern Ireland and then over to the UK. Now we see a lot going the other way. Much of that is affected by external pressures outside of our control in Ireland. That will put pressures on the border for us.