Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister's speech. By any objective analysis, the White Paper has resulted in clear action on the part of the Government. He has come before us today to articulate those areas where progress is being made, especially concerning access to education. That aspect is a key element for every young person in the direct provision process. Education is the key to building for a future where we integrate people and give them the rights to which they are entitled by dint of any international standard. I, therefore, welcome the progress on that aspect.

I do not propose to detain the House for too long, but I would like to ask the Minister about the Irish Nationality and Citizenship (Naturalisation of Minors Born in Ireland) Bill 2018. Regarding the recent success in getting agreement on this Bill, which, if fully implemented, would give a pathway to citizenship to children born in direct provision, if we could see that bearing fruit, it would be a massive leap forward for society. I acknowledge that the Government is committed to that. The campaign to count time as an asylum seeker as reckonable residence is ongoing. The Labour Party is in contact with the Movement of Asylum Seekers Ireland, MASI, on that issue. I am pretty sure the representatives of the Minister and the Government are also in contact in that regard. That would be a big leap forward.

We accepted the recommendations of the report by Catherine Day as our own de facto policy in September. We acknowledge that perhaps the Government's White Paper is marginally less ambitious than the Day report, but it is still very ambitious. That must be acknowledged. I welcome the progress regarding the issuance of driver licences as well. These are what I would call simple, low-hanging fruit issues, but they are significant to so many people in regard to giving them the freedoms to move, notwithstanding the current situation in which we find ourselves. It allows people to move.

It allows people freedom and independence. Therefore, we welcome progress in all of those respects.

We very much support the Government's position in respect of the White Paper and will work with it in pushing on the issues. We are hopeful that the commitment made in respect of the length of stay in reception or integration centres being no more than four months will prevail and succeed.

There is one issue that was brought to our attention yesterday. RTÉ reported, through its reporter, Laura Fletcher, that two healthcare workers had to leave their jobs in nursing homes due to issues over temporary accommodation. The story was widely reported yesterday on RTÉ. The report stated that these workers could no longer avail of a HSE temporary accommodation scheme and were subsequently returned to direct provision. In one case, a worker was placed 200 km from where she lived and worked. My understanding is that nowhere does it say in documentation, and the report highlights this, that eligibility criteria are dependent on whether or not there are Covid-19 cases in the workplace. The context of the HSE kicking these two workers out of temporary accommodation remains to be examined further. I will now quote from the report and one of the women involved: "My employer told me that you can't stay in the HSE accommodation anymore because they said that we don't have any case [of Covid-19] in our nursing home."

Am I out of time?

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