Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State. I am genuinely delighted by his appointment. I also welcome the officials from the Department with whom I worked.

One of the reasons I changed my mind about the validity of this Chamber - which Senator Norris will be delighted to hear - relates to the issue of direct provision. When I was Minister of State, it was the collective will of the people in this Chamber that something should be done about the issue. I was greatly impressed by the campaigning zeal of Senators across the Chamber to ensure that something practical could be done. In fairness to the Houses of the Oireachtas, unlike other parliaments in Europe, when legislation such as the International Protection Bill 2015 and other issues relating to direct provision are brought before the Houses for discussion, the amendments and questions put down in this Chamber and in the Dáil are always on the humanitarian side, never on the conservative side. In the case of the legislation to which I refer, an amendment to try to restrict access or play the race card was never tabled. We should take comfort from that without being complacent about it. There is a collective will in the Houses, across all parties, to do the right thing, which is to be commended.

The International Protection Act 2015 envisages that any new applicant for asylum in Ireland would be dealt with in a speedy manner - within six to nine months - through a single procedure mechanism in order to ensure that we do not have people in our asylum system for years on end. Much has been done recently to deal with direct provision. Many have been moved out of the system. There was a logjam and people were not able to get out - even when they had leave to remain in the country - to access housing and other services.

I was genuinely horrified when I read the programme for Government. When I read the draft programme, I was delighted to see a commitment to implement the working group report. Many people think the report does not go far enough. It does not end direct provision. I do not believe we can end direct provision because when we go beyond the one line hashtag of "#end direct provision" and dig deeper into the situation, we have to remind ourselves of what happened 15 years ago when direct provision was initiated because asylum seekers here were effectively homeless and without services. Direct provision was created as a short-term measure but, as happens sometimes in Irish public policy, a short-term measure became a long-term reality. The system that was envisioned as lasting for six months remained in place for ten and then 12 years. Children are growing up in this system. I visited 13 of these centres - some better than others - across Ireland. I could envisage myself spending time in some, in others I would not spend a night. There is one in Waterford that particularly sticks in my mind and we are overseeing this.

We should have a system that has excellent facilities, with proper oversight, with food preparation that is culturally sensitive, where children can play and people have community links and stay for a maximum of six months. The working group report contained the same vision. The Minister of State’s officials signed off on it. The reason I was horrified was that the non-governmental organisations, NGOs, which engaged in that process took a risk to come inside the door to work with officials and sign off on proposals that could be implemented. They were implementable because the officials signed off on them, from a right to work, to food, to education, to health care, etc. One NGO walked away. The rest stayed in the system and with the process and signed off on the report in order to try to have it implemented. The draft programme for Government stated that it would be implemented but in the actual programme, that line was deleted. Somebody said this line about implementing the report - which Department officials had stood over and which NGOs had taken a great risk to be involved in to protect possibly the most vulnerable children in the State - had to be deleted. I would love to know who said that. It was not the Minister of State because this predated his appointment. Somebody in the political system or the Department decided this report could not be implemented in full. I want to know why because everybody took a risk. Why would any decent NGO trying to make a difference by working with the system engage with the Department of Justice and Equality again?Why, if another working group was set up to deal with any issue, would an NGO come inside the tent, take a risk and do the hard work - in some cases for nine months - to then sign off on a report for a Government which produces a programme for Government that initially states it will implement the report but then deletes the line? Somebody went out of his or her way to delete that line.