Pa Daly (Kerry, Sinn Fein)

Unfortunately, we have turned a corner in this State. During the past week, we have had convictions for racially motivated murders and the lives of babies put in danger in Drogheda, where there was no way out of a burning building except down a stairs. Some of the online commentary in response to the attack in Drogheda were: "the person who did it must be staying there", "it was an inside job", "they did it themselves", "immigrants looking for better accommodation", "scum will get a nicer hotel now" and "there are other issues that are more shocking". Are they more shocking than attacking children in a burning building or attempted murder? It is unbelievable to have heard this in the same week Sr. Stanislaus Kennedy passed away.

If people keep spreading hate and misinformation, these attacks are inevitable. There is nothing new to this type of misinformation. I recently read a debate in Britain from 40 or 50 years ago where Roy Jenkins said, "a few people whether, out of political opportunism or personal inadequacy, have deliberately whipped up prejudice, playing on fear and ignorance, and blaming immigrants for problems which are none of their making - but which stemmed from previous parsimony in housing, schools and welfare services." Similarly, a Welsh politician once said that if you do not have a programme, a bogeyman will do. Who better to pick on than people who are voiceless and, crucially, poor, such as asylum seekers? In my constituency, we admired people such as Mike Quill from Kerry, a union leader in New York who always preached an anti-racist message. He said that if blacks and Jews were good enough to fight and die beside, they were good enough to live beside and work beside also. There was also Sr. Stanislaus, of course, and Hugh O'Flaherty, who said, "God has no country".

The lessons were set out to the Government years ago that there should have been more State-run accommodation. Unfortunately, nothing was done about that in the previous Dáil and a lot of the problems fall squarely at the feet of the Government.

See this speech in context