Denis O'Donovan (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Curran. I wish him every success in his new brief and congratulate him on his continued role in office. I have no doubt he has a very important role to play. I am sure he will bring a breath of fresh air to this important brief.

To reflect on where we have come from in the past ten or 12 years, I remember being the spokesman on justice in the Seanad from 1997 to 2002, when the whole area of immigration, including the issue of illegal immigration and asylum seeking, was in its infancy in Ireland. There was a trickle coming in at that stage and the Government and the then Minister, the current Ceann Comhairle, Deputy John O'Donoghue, had to deal with a developing situation where the number of people coming into the country per month had gone from perhaps 50 or 60 to approximately 1,200 or 1,300 at one stage.

At that time, in 1996 to 1997, we had little or no infrastructure to deal with the situation that was evolving. I recall queues and chaos in the late 1990s because no system was in place. I give credit to the Government for the substantial funding, structures, appeal mechanisms and so on that were put in place to deal with the evolving situation. I have no doubt, given the contribution of the Minister of State in the House today and the contributions to the seminar, that we have improved by leaps and bounds in that ten to 12 year period. While I am not suggesting we are in a utopian situation and that everything is perfect, significant structures are now in place to deal with all the issues that confronted the then Minister from 1997 to 2002.

Through representing a remote part of Ireland, I have no doubt the whole issue of immigration has added a great flavour and given a boost to the culture of Ireland in many diverse ways. It has been a good experience and, by and large, it has been good for the country, although there will always be exceptions. We were seen not just for decades but for centuries as a people who emigrated to America, Australia and all over Europe. Recently, however, probably because of our economic boom, we were suddenly confronted with inward migration. While it was perhaps a hot potato to deal with at the beginning, we have come to deal with it in many ways.

The area where I live is very cosmopolitan. Growing up, for years we had many German people retiring to west Cork as well as many English and Dutch people. All of a sudden, in any of the towns and villages, there is now a mixture of Polish and Latvian people, with perhaps some Chinese and so on, which adds a great flavour. When we talk about the situation of immigration having brought all sorts of problems and having increased crime, my personal experience is that, by and large, this has not been the case. There are criminals in all societies and, unfortunately, that is also reflected in the immigrant communities.

I would like to quote from the paper by Pat Folan, director general of the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service. I read with some interest his paper, in which he made some important points. It is important to note the constitutional position as set out particularly by Ms Justice Denham in a very important running in the Bode case. Pat Folan stated:

Therefore migration is entirely dependent on the approach of the receiving State.

Indeed, one of the most fundamental duties, in fact one of the defining features, of any nation state is the responsibility to safeguard the security and integrity of its borders. This duty has been confirmed by the Irish courts on a number of occasions, most recently last December [that would have been December 2001] in the judgement of Ms Justice Denham in her ruling in the Bode case. In her words,

In every State, of whatever model, the State has the power to control the entry, the residency and the exit, of foreign nationals. This power is an aspect of the executive power to protect the integrity of the State. [This is quite true of Ireland and other countries.]

It is this power that the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service and the Garda National Immigration Bureau exercise on behalf of the Minister. Put at its simplest, the State can and must regulate who can and can't enter the State. Therefore permission to enter or reside in Ireland, to again quote Justice Denham, is "a determination that the common good is served by giving benefits of residency to a category of foreign nationals - as a gift, in effect".

That is a clear statement of the legal framework, within which the Government must work. While the Minister of State might not have an immediate answer, perhaps he might come back to me if not in this House then in correspondence. Since the baseline of 1997, what has been the overall cost to the State of setting up the various structures to deal with immigration and so on? What has it cost over the past decade? What are the current costs and so on? I accept where we are. We are at this stage and we have gained much from the whole area of immigration.

The Minister of State and Senator Regan both referred to road safety and translation of papers. This is a very good thing. We often hear of unfortunate road deaths involving people from eastern Europe or other nations who normally drive on the other side of the road to the one to which we are accustomed. Is there a greater proportion of non-Irish nationals killed on our roads compared with Irish drivers? Is that a worrying trend or is it just that it is highlighted where we have an atrocious case of someone driving down the wrong lane on a motorway when four or five people are killed? Perhaps the Minister of State might reflect on that matter and come back to me.

I refer to the 2006 census figures, which showed there were then 408,000 migrants, representing 188 nationalities in Ireland. Eight of those nationalities have communities in excess of 10,000 people resident in this country. I presume this includes the Polish and possibly the Chinese and others. Will the Minister of State confirm whether this trend is increasing or, owing to the economic downturn in the past 18 months or two years, decreasing? While we often think of immigrants as people from eastern Europe or parts of Africa, it is interesting that in 2006 the number of Americans in the country had doubled - I presume since the previous census. Also a statistic of some academic interest only is that there were 112,000 UK nationals who are not counted in the overall figures. Taking into account all the statistics we have and allowing for the fact there may be a small percentage of unaccounted for people in our system from various countries who have either come in illegally or crossed the Border from Northern Ireland, would it be fair to say we are much closer to an overall figure of 15% rather than 10%, which is the presumed position?

I accept the Minister of State is new to the Department. Obviously this would pertain more to large urban areas like Dublin or Cork. Is the Department concerned about ghettoisation of communities of migrants? I am not making that point to engage with the Minister of State in a difficult situation. I have read a lot and have been to Germany at least three or four times. There was a major problem at one stage - I felt the German authorities did not deal with it that well - of Turkish immigrants who formed ghettoes and did not in any way integrate into German society. That was a worrying trend. It was not a few hundred here and there. I understand at one stage it was well in excess of 2 million or 3 million people. I would not like to see any ethnic minority coming to this country forming ghettoes, streets or enclaves that might cause difficulties down the road for society.

My experience from the parts of west County Cork and Kerry, with which I am more familiar, is that people integrate quite freely. Younger people go to discos and pubs and shop freely. Five or six years ago I was in Youghal in east County Cork for a weekend. I happened to go to Mass on a Sunday morning not realising that it was a special Polish Mass for Polish immigrants. I was the odd one out in the church because it was all in Polish. It is good to see that in our society and churches, whether Catholic, Church of Ireland or whatever denomination, people practise their religion and can do so freely in this country. It is an indication of our open society.

I refer to the paper by Carmel Foley. The Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission has taken on a new role in investigating the area of migration etc. In recent years as the Minister of State said in his contribution, there are approximately 600 - I presume - gardaí from various backgrounds involved in dealing with complaints etc. There was one particularly difficult case with which the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission had to deal. It involved the death of a person in, I believe, Tralee, County Kerry, while in custody. I am not sure how that ended up and it may be still sub judice. If that is the case, I do not expect the Minister of State to comment on it.

It is interesting that the Garda Síochána Act 2005, in setting up this new role, has given strong and extensive powers to the body for dealing with complaints against gardaí, particularly complaints concerning minorities and policing. For example, it has given powers to arrest and to detain for questioning, power to enter and search places and to take photographs, finger prints and bodily samples. It is interesting that in one instance the new body entered a Garda station under the remit of the chief superintendent of the area and carried out an investigation.

An outreach programme was set up to deal with the issues relating to gardaí, minorities and immigration. Will the Minister of State give us an update on how this outreach programme is working? Does it operate on a pilot basis or has it been developed extensively throughout the country and in both rural and urban areas?

It is important too that the Minister of State refers to the recent Bill on human trafficking. The Criminal Law (Human Trafficking) Act came into effect in June 2008. One of the downsides of immigration was trafficking, something that was totally alien to this country 20 years ago. This is a sinister crime and we have been obliged to introduce legislation to deal with it. We had an unfortunate situation in Wexford where, as a result of an attempt to traffic in humans, several lives were lost. There was a similar poignant case in the south of England where a large number of people died in a container. Human trafficking must be stamped out totally and I am glad the new legislation is in place.

We must be ever vigilant against trafficking. I am particularly concerned at the trafficking of women for prostitution or other abuse. This is appalling. Children are also being trafficked. Some gangs have been exposed in Italy and elsewhere that were involved in paedophilia. I urge the Minister of State to be extremely vigilant in this regard. Human trafficking is a deplorable act, but we must be even more vigilant where innocent women and defenceless children are involved. I wish the Minister of State luck in his brief and hope he will be able to respond to some of the issues I have raised. I will be more than glad to listen to his response.