Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Let us look at the 846. They have been approved under the other schemes, but the Minister of State has no information on whether they arrived in Ireland. Obviously, we thought another scheme was necessary in response to what happened in August 2021. Given our horror at what was happening in the streets, cities and towns of Afghanistan, and the fact that things were going backwards for women and children, we brought in a new scheme. A year later, absolutely nobody has been brought in under that scheme. Suddenly, within three days, we have progress and there have been 22 approvals. However, it is still the case that nothing has happened on the ground. We have welcomed what the Government has done with regard to refugees from Ukraine, but we cannot make distinctions in terms of the way we are doing it. The Ombudsman has issued a report today on how we treat children from different countries. This is one opportunity to show that we are making it work. Can the Minister of State please explain why there has been such a delay?

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