Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

What we saw on Mount Street last week was a visualisation of the stark failures of the Government's immigration and asylum system. The Government has failed. The Minister is clearly out of his depth. Communities have been antagonised and vulnerable people left in atrocious and inhumane conditions. This should not be complicated. We need an asylum system that is fair, efficient and enforced. Those fleeing conflict and persecution and Ireland need this and our communities demand this.

The failure to enforce the current system has increased pressure on accommodation for those seeking asylum. It has left some people, like those on Mount Street, on the streets. It is taking far too long to process applications for asylum. That has to change. If someone comes to Ireland to seek asylum, their application should be processed quickly and there are no excuses for an application to take years.

If people are entitled to asylum, they should be quickly given the necessary support to enter the workforce and help enrich our country, just as Irish people have done elsewhere for generations. It is clear that the Government must speed up the processing of international protection applicants who come from so-called safe countries. They must ensure full and final decisions are made as fast as possible in order that we have a system which works for all applicants. In the case of all applicants, if people are not entitled to asylum, the requirement to leave must be enforced.

The reliance on the private sector, which comprises a small cohort of individuals and companies which are making huge profits from the system, is a scandal. Communities are paying the price. The reliance on the private sector means communities are not consulted and are losing key local facilities and amenities and, as a result, they are becoming angry.

The Minister has to work with and listen to people. He cannot ride roughshod over communities, many of whom have for too long been left behind. I am talking about small rural towns that have been crying out for investment in services for decades. In many rural towns and villages, refugee accommodation programmes have worked very well. In all of those cases, it was because there was communication, engagement and planning around education, health and integration with local communities.

What we are now seeing, however, day in, day out, are the consequences of the Government's shambolic approach and failure to plan, such as the housing crisis and the lack of GPs, dentists and gardaí. None of these issues is dealt with. Communities are under pressure and are being put under even more pressure, and they feel no one is listening. No one in the Government, it seems, understands the difficulties they are facing. Communities who have welcomed those seeking international protection have not received the investment they were promised. We have to deal with this in a way that is fair, efficient and enforced, as my party colleague said. Sinn Féin believes State-provided accommodation should be properly located, resourced and serviced, and the Government must start planning to return hotels and other buildings to their original purposes so as to restore local tourism-based economies and vital services for communities.

To deal with the migration crisis, we also have to deal with the factors that are pushing people from their home countries. We need to work for an end to conflicts that are creating devastation and driving migration in Ukraine, the Middle East and Africa. We cannot support, as some Members do, warmongering and militarisation on the one hand, and then be surprised when it leads to further flows of displaced people on the other.

When the Government signed up to the temporary protection directive in respect of Ukraine, Ireland became an outlier in terms of conditions offered. Some Fianna Fáil representatives at the time suggested we might have up to 200,000 arrivals from Ukraine, and Sinn Féin raised serious concerns about the Government's lack of consideration as to the capacity to deal with such large numbers. We have about half those numbers and the entire system has collapsed. Those temporary measures will expire next year. The Government must plan for that and signal that our immigration laws will apply across the board. That means those here from Ukraine will need to either get a work visa or apply for international protection, in the same way as all others who are fleeing war. This mess has gone on for too long.

It is unacceptable that the Minister, who might take that smirk off his face, made an entire speech without acknowledging a single failure on his part or on that of his Department. The Government has to get its act together because we cannot go on any longer operating a system that is not fair, efficient or enforced. The longer he continues to operate, as he has been, with his head in the sand, the longer this crisis will go on and the further detached local communities will become from this process.

See this speech in context