Barry Andrews (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

This Bill is long and complex legislation bringing together much previous legislation and consolidating it in one Act. That is welcome. It is timely legislation. Immigration and how we deal with asylum seekers tells much about a nation. In so far as we have a political impression of another country, it is often informed by how it treats immigrants. Former Prime Minister John Howard's Australia is a place where the treatment of immigrants and asylum seekers would be considered draconian and was bad for the image of Australia. Mr. Howard spoke in this House; I would not cross the road to hear him speak because of his immigration policies. It was an embarrassment to many Australians.

The American presidential election is centred largely on the positions the candidates take on immigration. In Ireland there is not such a debate. Much sensitivity surrounds it and rightly so. Perhaps people are discouraged from commenting on it because they think they will be accused of being racist if they have negative views of immigration or, maybe worse, being considered liberal if they have positive views on it. This debate does not take place as much as it should because it will be a major challenge for Ireland. This Bill is timely because it gives us the opportunity for this debate.

The first aspect that strikes me about the Bill is that integration is not dealt with. Integration is the other side of immigration that also needs to be debated fully and at the same time. Yet there is no signpost towards that issue anywhere in this Bill. It is unfortunate that it would not be spoken of in the same sense politically. This is a sort of rule book on how to get into this State, but we need to take it further than that in this debate. Integration is the key to the exercise.

Immigration policy is an executive function and nobody disputes that. It is for the Government to set the rules and there is no argument on that. Hence we are delighted to have this opportunity to have an input into how this is framed. Much of the criticism of the Bill centres on whether it should contain more and not leave so much for another day, for a ministerial diktat. I do not mean that in a pejorative sense. I share the view that more detail should be in the Bill.

Although employment permits do not come into this issue, I would like to make the following point on the development aid we give. We encourage people from countries to which we give development aid to get green cards. We train them and then assist in the brain drain from those countries by encouraging them to come to this country. There is a lack of coherence in how we deal with that issue. If we give training, as we do in many of the Irish Aid programme countries, and then encourage the well trained and educated people from those countries to come here through a green card preferential system, we lack coherence in policy.

What the Irish Government is doing in Chad is the best thing we have ever done for refugees. There are approximately 500,000 refugees in eastern Chad as a result of what has happened in Darfur in the past few years. The Irish Government has taken a brave, visionary decision and it is crucial for the EU that it succeeds. That is the frontline of the issue of refugees and how we protect them. The majority of refugees and internally displaced persons are in Africa or close to places where there is unrest. They are not in Europe. If we are to have a global policy that considers all refugees, that is where we should put most resources to protect refugees.

If a country can, to some extent, define itself politically on the issue of immigration, we can be pleased that our record is generally positive. One example of this was our decision to allow workers from all the countries that joined the EU in 2004 immediate access to our labour market. This sent out a positive message about Ireland's attitude to immigration. Likewise, the State's treatment of asylum seekers is generally positive. My one caveat in this regard is that applications take far too long to process. This is the one area in which we fall down.

The Bill provides that the Minister may require a bond from visa applicants. I have no difficulty with this measure but it would be prudent to include some provision whereby a maximum amount may be set. A bond that is too high effectively amounts to a refusal. Section 60(4) refers to maximum amounts that may be prescribed in the case of a foreign national's liability for his or her removal from the State. Section 13, which deals with deposits and bonds, should include a similar provision. I have no difficulty with the principle of bonds but I am concerned that there might be no constraint on the upper limit of those bonds.

Section 14 imposes no requirement that the Minister must process applications in a timely way. As I said, this is one of the general failings of our immigration system. Deputy Coveney gave an interesting example from his own constituency and I will do the same. I was approached by a person whose mother sought an extension of her visa because she was undergoing emergency medical treatment. Her application was certified by a medical practitioner who stated that she required medical treatment and was not fit to travel and advised that she be granted an extension of her visa in these circumstances. By the time the Department issued its decision on the application, she was dead. In any case, the application was refused. Such insensitivity is not uncommon.

Applications must be processed in a reasonable time. I do not propose a defined limit of eight weeks, six months or whatever, but the primary legislation should at least provide that applications are processed by the Minister within a reasonable time. I do not want to open up the possibility of the Minister being sued on a daily basis for not issuing a decision within a specific period, but there must be some provision to ensure more speedier processing of applications. In addition, where medical evidence is given that an individual requires an extension to a visa, that extension should be granted automatically. A case such as I described does not represent a good day's work for the Government.

I notice nothing in the Bill on the renewal of visas. Multiple entry on the same visa is another issue that has arisen in the courts. There is confusion as to whether a person who is here on a visa can leave and re-enter the State on that same visa during the three-month period. This issue must be reviewed.

The costs of a person's removal from the State are fixed on the deportee. I have no difficulty with this and I welcome the exclusion of minors from this provision. However, this exemption should be extended to include aged out minors, that is, those who arrived in the State aged under 18 years and have been waiting four or five years, through no fault of their own, for their applications to be processed. They should not face the costs of their deportation. It is a discretionary power and I am sure the Minister would not exercise it in those circumstances. Nevertheless, it would be helpful if this category of persons were specified in the Bill as being excluded from meeting the costs of their deportation.

Public health concerns represent a sensitive issue and I approach it with caution. It has rightly become part of the debate but we must deal with it in a sensible way. We must take measures to protect public health given the evidence of a higher incidence of certain contagious diseases among foreign nationals entering the State. I am not sure the Bill goes far enough in offering protection to the public against these contagious diseases. It provides that an immigration officer can form a view that a person could be a threat to public health by virtue of having one of the diseases listed on the World Health Organisation website. How can an immigration officer be trained to identify the signs of infection with tuberculosis, for example? It is worth investigating whether any immigration officer was able to identify that any applicant or person who presented at the borders of the State was carrying a contagious disease. I doubt it has ever happened. This provision is unsatisfactory and the Bill does not go far enough to protect public health.

Another ground for exclusion from the State is where someone has a criminal conviction. Presumably applicants will have to declare that they have no criminal record. If the person comes from a state with a spent convictions regime, should we recognise any spent convictions he or she may have or will we apply our own spent convictions legislation, if it is ever introduced? I ask the Minister to take this into account. He has been most generous with his time.

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