Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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12. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality to provide an update on the latest departmental activities in the management of international protection; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [17721/24]

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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Will the Minister provide an update on the latest departmental activities in the management of international protection and make a statement on the matter?

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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My Department has taken a significant number of measures to increase the capacity of the international protection system. Reforms to this process will continue this year and beyond.

In November 2022, I introduced an accelerated procedure for international protection applicants from designated safe countries of origin. This now applies to ten countries, with Botswana and Algeria added this January. These applicants now typically receive a first instance decision in less than three months and the number of applications from these safe countries has reduced by more than 50% compared to the previous 12-month period. I am in the process of reviewing a further eight countries in terms of safe country of origin status.

Last July, I published a report on the international protection modernisation programme from 2023 to 2024. This involved unparalleled investment in staff, panel members, re-engineered processes, and technology. We have implemented measures to improve efficiencies and throughput and enhanced the application, interview and decision-making process for applicants. This has already demonstrated results, with the International Protection Office confident of delivering more than 14,000 decisions this year. Approximately €34 million in additional funding was allocated in 2024's budget. The IPO and the International Protection Appeals Tribunal will continue to scale up with this funding.

As the Deputy will be aware, we will shortly seek approval to opt into the EU migration pact. We just had discussions this afternoon and will have more next week. The pact will further enhance our capacity and build on what has been achieved. The pact will significantly reform the current approach to migration and asylum in Ireland and across the wider EU by providing a robust legislative framework to address the challenges faced in this regard. It will speed up processing of international protection applications so that we have a firmer and fairer system. Under the accelerated procedure that I mentioned, we already have the ability to turn around applications more quickly and support those who genuinely need our protection. For those who do not, the sooner we can give them a negative decision, the easier it is to remove them. The pact will introduce greater security checking of applicants.

This is a situation we cannot deal with on our own. We need co-operation and to work together, which is what the pact is proposing.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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Following criticism, we have seen an increase in recent months in the Department’s activity in terms of deportation orders and so on. However, the extent of the flow of asylum seekers into Ireland, the majority of whom have previously successfully crossed the EU’s external borders elsewhere, is by no means clear. The State’s capacity to respond effectively could be affected. The new normal, according to the Minister, Deputy O’Gorman, is 15,000 to 20,000 asylum and international protection seekers annually. Have we that capacity? I do not believe we do, or anything like it. We are ramping up and making a show of strength due to significant concerns, but as matters stand, no such process is envisaged.

The current indications are that the Government does not want a debate on this issue. Okay, there was a committee meeting today lasting three hours and there will be a further three hours next week, but that is for show and semantics. The Government is hellbent on opting into this pact when we should be opting out.

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I will continue to be clear that this pact is not being forced on anyone. It was first presented in 2016, with a second iteration in 2020. During every stage of the debate, be it in the European Parliament, the European Council, the committee of justice or the European affairs ministers Council, which I was a member of a number of years ago, opportunities were available to Members of this House and the Seanad to discuss issues under Topical Issue Debates, Commencement matters, Private Members’ business and other forms of debate.

The pact will ensure that we have a system that is more effective than our current one. Of course, we are already working towards accelerated procedures. In the past two years alone, we have gone from processing approximately 3,000 applications per year to 13,000, with 9,000 people receiving a first instance decision last year. We have been able to increase our figures to that scale. If we opt into the EU pact in the next two weeks, which I hope we will, we will invest more to ensure we can meet the turnaround times that are set out and that we should be adhering to in the first instance.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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It is clear that the Government is hellbent on opting in with no discussion. It took eight years to come up with the pact and the Minister is telling Deputies that we had ample opportunity in that time to come up with solutions, questions, Topical Issues or whatever. The Government is hellbent on ignoring the Irish people. It got its message from them loud and clear in the referendum, so why rush this through? What kind of discriminatory feeling does the Government have towards the Irish people? We are going to be forced to take thousands upon thousands of migrants inside our border. The Minister keeps saying that is not the Government’s intention, but it does intend to opt into the pact. The Government will not put the question to the people because it knows what answer it will get – it got a freagra uafásach in the referendum – so it has decided to just put it to the Houses of the Oireachtas in a set amount of time and to use the Government’s contrived majority to ensure it passes. People are concerned about this further ceding of our national sovereignty to unelected bureaucrats in the European Commission.

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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The people did vote for this. They voted for it in the form of the Lisbon treaty.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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They did not vote for this.

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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The treaty clearly sets out that migration is an EU competence. What we fought for was the option to opt in. The only obligation from a constitutional perspective is that both Houses agree this. That is exactly what we are doing.

To be clear, nothing is being forced upon us. We are deciding to opt into a set of measures that we are already a member of. We have been part of a common European asylum system since 2009. This is about upgrading and improving the measures and ensuring that our system is more efficient and effective. The pact does not force anything on anyone here. It will ensure that we are in a position to provide protection more quickly to people who genuinely need it and to return those who do not – there are many – to the countries from which they came.