Alan Farrell (Dublin Fingal, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the discussion and I very much welcome the investment in people and places. It is very important that we diversify the option for the purposes of ensuring in the first instance that we can keep people out of tents in the city centre. That is an objective I think we all share in this House. I make the point to Deputy O'Callaghan that one does not necessarily need to be the local TD to make that observation. I certainly agree that in the protection of those individuals and the processing of those applications, and in ensuring those individuals are treated humanely, we should have an objective to provide more facilities to ensure we can process individuals in a more timely manner. As I said, however, I really welcome the investment in people and places, particularly with regard to the number of processing staff and the reduction in time it will take now that we have signed up to the pan-European arrangements. I know the huge work that is being done by individuals within the Minister's Department to get that up and off the ground.

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