Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Who are our own? Are they the very wealthy people who sink their money offshore or avail of tax loopholes so that they do not have to pay their fair share? Are they the people who lost the €20 billion that we cannot find from NAMA, as Deputy Wallace mentioned earlier? Are they the people in the financial centre on the docks who are insisting that we keep €13 billion of Apple money in an escrow account? The resources are there to look after everybody, but they are not being shared equally. The resources are there to look after the grandparents, sisters and brothers of the most unfortunate migrants who already live here. I think this rhetoric is unhelpful in the extreme.

I want to return to the facts of what will happen in Marrakesh tomorrow. Many countries are signing up to the global compact and many countries are popping out of it. Many people, including some who are quite conservative, have said it does not go far enough. According to one commentator:

In fact, the Global Compact – which aims to promote international co-operation on migration flows – is a vague, non-binding document full of long-winded, gobbledygook claptrap that includes a few worthy principles and a couple of dumb ideas. But it won’t force anyone to do anything.

The compact is being used by certain people as an excuse to mobilise racist sentiment. Deputies should be aware that such sentiment is often mobilised on the basis of scarcity of resources. We live in a country that has a housing crisis. It also has a health crisis, with trolleys choking up the corridors of accident and emergency departments everywhere. It cannot look after the special needs of children in its schools even though it has one of the fastest-growing economies in Europe. There is something fundamentally wrong about the way we share our resources. If we are saying we are not going to look after migrants because of the crises I have mentioned, we are sending the wrong signal. We need to come in here every day to demand that wealth is shared equally and that resources are used to look after everybody. There is only one race and it is called the human race. I know the Minister of State agrees with that, but we have to start practising it, believing it and implementing it in our policies. The Bill before the House is a small measure that would go a great way to recognising that.

I repeat that nobody goes anywhere and expects a free ticket. People do not want to sit on their backsides and live off welfare payments. The vast majority of human beings want to use their ability, their work and their intelligence to have an impact on the society they live in. Part of the solution is to give people the right to work. We have debated the rights of people in direct provision previously. This legislation represents a way of starting to recognise that there is a crisis among families living here. They are unable to access their own loved ones and the supports that such access would bring. I do not know whether the Minister of State has ever tried to put himself in their shoes. I have often tried to put myself in their shoes. I cannot imagine what it must be like to live in the utter misery, heartbreak, sorrow, isolation and loneliness in which they live. They encounter further difficulties of culture and language and they may meet hostility on the streets. I plead with the Minister of State to talk to his Government colleagues about not opposing this Bill. If we do not take positive measures aimed at being inclusive with regard to immigration, we will feed into the sort of filth that is outside the gates tonight and against which we need to build a strong message. I would like the Minister of State to ask the Cabinet to reconsider its position on this Bill and to give it its full support.

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