Michael McNamara (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I wish to raise the ongoing need for consultation with communities which are hosting persons with temporary protection and international protection applicants. I want to give an example, which is the area where I come from and where I live, east Clare. Soon after the outbreak of the war in Ukraine last year, 40 Ukrainians arrived in Flagmount. Earlier this year, the east Clare holiday village was repurposed and 220 arrived. Very recently, the former hotel in Scarriff was repurposed and is taking up to 75 asylum seekers. Throughout that time the medical centre in Scarriff that serves all of those areas has received no communication whatsoever from either International Protection Accommodation Services, IPAS, or the HSE, with regard to this. The Taoiseach will know that medical centres across Ireland generally, and particularly in rural Ireland, are under pressure. There are more GPs retiring than coming through for rural practice. There are difficulties around that. They obviously want to provide a service to everybody in their community, both people who have been there for a long time and people who have recently arrived. We simply cannot pretend that new people arriving does not create additional pressures in a community. It does. If people do not speak English fluently, or at all in some instances, it will create additional difficulties in that consultation periods are longer. I am not saying that IPAS can arrive with a new GP because people are being housed. I am not expecting the impossible but communities are entitled to know what the plan to develop services is because nobody is expecting the war to end tomorrow. Nobody is expecting immigration to end tomorrow. What is the plan or is there a plan?

I am not looking to blame anybody here but we need an all-of-government approach because we need to make sure that the people who are coming are integrated and receive the services they require, just as we need to make sure there is not a reduction or diminution in services in the communities which are receiving them. That would be profoundly unfair. Obviously, there is a disparity across the country with some areas receiving far more than others and some areas with the capacity to take more than others. There is a disparity and that needs to be matched with resources. Yes, the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, has moneys but it needs to be more profound than just arriving with a chequebook because arriving with a chequebook will not provide additional medical services where they are needed. Arriving with a chequebook will not provide the teaching of the English language to foreign students as a speciality because these are specialist services. I am not saying the Government should be able to provide those services instantly but there has to be a plan and communities are entitled to know what that plan is.

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