Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Tánaiste's views in respect of the big idea, that is, a major initiative for Europe's neighbourhood, particularly on a new Marshall plan for Africa. This is really good and we should be leading on the issue. We should also be willing to contribute significantly to it. Our moral authority to argue on any of these issues is greatly diminished as long as we have patently inadequate facilities for dealing with migrants into this country. I do not agree that it would send out the wrong signal - something I have heard on many occasions - to regularise the few thousand people involved. The number is, in comparison with what Spain, Italy, Greece or Malta is receiving, minuscule. It would end direct provision and deal with people expeditiously as they arrive from now on.

We should also regularise the undocumented, many of whom, or whose parents, we invited here. For example, the Mauritians who came to work here, or their children, should now be regularised. If our moral authority in asking the Americans to regularise the Irish undocumented is to have any force, we must do that.

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