Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)

I am pleased to have an opportunity to speak on the Bill. One good thing about Thursday afternoons in the House is there are generally fewer Members wishing to speak and this gives speakers an opportunity to make longer contributions.

The introduction of this Bill is to be welcomed. This is a complex Bill and I do not propose to deal with in detail as this can be done on Committee Stage in a painstaking way to amend and improve it where appropriate and confirm its positive elements. This is an opportunity for Members to make general comments on immigration, asylum and residency issues. This Bill, rightly or wrongly, deals with asylum as well as with people who wish to come here to live and work and become residents and complex issues arise. It is worth noting that the number of people coming to Ireland to claim asylum has dropped dramatically in recent years, with fewer than 4,000 last year — 3,985, to be exact — a 66% drop compared to 2002.

There are many reasons for this decrease. The number of people claiming asylum is falling steadily rather than dramatically. There has been an increase in the number of people wishing to come to Ireland to work and start a new life here outside of the asylum process. However, many people try to come to Ireland, for whatever reason, to look for a better life. They use the asylum process to attempt to do so because it is the only means available to them. They end up in the same filing cabinet as people who are genuinely fleeing persecution and who may have been tortured and imprisoned and seek the protection of the Irish State. It always amazes me how they manage to arrive on the island of Ireland. My office in Cork is in a central location and I hear many tragic asylum stories.

New legislation in this area is required and this Bill is welcome. I wish to express some caution about the detention in prison of persons to be deported. I am pleased the Minister rejected the lobbying effort to have asylum seekers detained while awaiting a decision on their applications. This would have put Ireland back into the Dark Ages, even though other countries have decided to detain them. The detention of persons against whom a decision has been made to deport them is questionable, in particular when they are held in a prison cell. If it is the Government's view that people need to be detained, I suggest it considers using detention facilities that are not those used for prisoners and criminals, for the sake of humanity, if nothing else.

I am somewhat confused about the long-term residency status application process versus the short-term residency non-renewable one year residence permission. I assume the concept is to allow people to come here and study or work for one year and then return home. However, it is conditional on them not reapplying; there seems to be a non-renewable residence permission for one year. I ask the Minister to clarify this matter. It should be possible to facilitate a person who comes here and is given a one-year residency permit, who proves to be a great success in Ireland and who wishes to apply for a longer-term residency permit.

I refer to the asylum process as it stands and the proposals in the Bill. I would like to see a greater onus on the State to make decisions on asylum applications within a set timeframe and if it is not possible to do so, we should consider allowing asylum seekers to work. If the Department determines that it would take up to a year or 18 months to make an assessment of a complicated asylum application, there should be an acknowledgement that after a certain period of time the person should be allowed to integrate into society because he or she will be staying here for some time. Instead that onus is not on the State. Six months is a reasonable timeframe for the Department and its agencies to determine asylum applications. If a decision cannot be made in six months, that applicant's position should be reviewed in terms of his or her right to work and integrate into society in a more real way. For example, local authorities are required to make decisions on planning applications within eight weeks. It is fundamentally wrong for a system to allow an asylum application that may or may not be complex to drag on forever. Deputies have met many applicants who have been waiting for asylum decisions for years, which is not healthy for the people involved or for the State.

Comments have been made about an independent review system. There have been problems with the existing appeals tribunal regarding inconsistency in determinations. Barristers and solicitors will say that depending on who the judge happens to be leads to an increased or reduced likelihood of a positive outcome for an appeal of an asylum decision. We need to address that problem and ensure we have a structure in place that delivers absolute consistency. We are talking about people's lives. They are either genuine asylum seekers or they are not. It is of the utmost importance to have an absolutely consistent process that is not arbitrary or determined by the opinions of a judge or anybody else but is determined merely on the facts involved.

It is extremely important to retain the ministerial discretion to grant leave to remain on humanitarian grounds. I would question how it currently functions. Somebody may be refused asylum, fail during the various appeals processes and, in a last effort, appeal to the Minister to stay on humanitarian grounds. Those grounds are considered by a panel of advisers and a recommendation is made to the Minister. That system needs to be reviewed and clear criteria put in place as to what is valid when considering leave to remain on humanitarian grounds.

The previous speaker spoke about language issues regarding immigrants coming to Ireland. It is reasonable that somebody applying to remain in Ireland permanently should have made some effort to learn English or Irish or both in order to show good faith in their willingness and eagerness to integrate into Irish society in a real way. However, there are responsibilities on the State in that regard. I am very familiar with the English language teaching services for immigrants in my city, Cork, which are totally inadequate. While there are some good projects, they rely primarily on volunteers, with retired teachers agreeing to teach on a voluntary basis in accommodation provided in, for example, a convent which is provided voluntarily by the order involved. That is not good enough. If we are going to require people to have a reasonable knowledge of English and to make an effort to speak and converse in Ireland, we need to introduce the structures that can facilitate that process. I am not satisfied we are doing that at the moment.

A number of speakers raised issues regarding marriage and the supposed problem of marriage of convenience whereby people arrange marriages to make it easier for them to become residents in Ireland or to get permission to remain here. I would like to see figures on that. There is considerable potential for scaremongering and exaggerating a problem that I have not encountered in any significant numbers even though my office comes across many asylum applicants and other immigrants. I would caution us placing restrictions on the ability of someone to marry a foreign national, particularly as Ireland becomes a more multicultural and multinational place.

While the new Ireland should not have an open door policy on immigration, there certainly should be an acceptance that Ireland is an open and welcoming place for new people, new ideas, new workers, new industry, new investment and all the rest. In everything we do we should support the structure and the institution that is marriage and family. I would be very concerned at any effort to restrict or intimidate people away from marriage in that context. On Committee Stage, we can consider the specifics that have been expressed by a series of organisations on marriage issues. As I see a note being passed to Deputy Andrews, perhaps he will respond to the issue.

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