Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Labour) | Oireachtas source

The last time I spoke on this issue, the Minister described my contribution as bizarre and extraordinary. I hope my contribution is a bit more to his liking today.

I wish to inform the House that on the anniversary of the election of Donald Trump, 8 November, in Liberty Hall, there will be an event called Irish Stand, raising funds directly for young people in direct provision. There is a youth project with which the Irish Refugee Council is involved which is in danger of closure. Performers including Senator Frances Black and others will be performing on the night. On 8 November last year, everybody felt a little bit colder and the world seemed a little bit less generous.

I am very critical of the Government's attitude towards this issue, as the Minister knows. In the draft programme for Government there was a sentence in black and white, which I remember reading, stating that the Government would implement the recommendations of the McMahon report. When the actual programme for Government came out, that sentence had been deleted. I do not know who deleted it, if it was a political figure or somebody in the Minister's Department. It was certainly no longer there and the commitment was no longer in evidence.

As Senator Norris quite rightly said, it is to be welcomed that the Minister has announced that the Government will move to enable people in the asylum system - not all of whom are in direct provision - to access the labour force. Again, as has been stated, that is on foot of a Supreme Court judgment and not anything that came from within the Government. I hope the Minister will not consider it bizarre or extraordinary for me to say that people should spend no more than six months in the system. If that were the situation, we would be able stand over the system as it is.

It is very difficult to stand over a system that allows people to languish in these centres for a prolonged period. I visited many of these centres, as I am sure the Minister has. If he has not, I encourage him to do so. The Minister of State, Deputy Stanton has visited a huge number of them. The stench of desperation, particularly for children, will persist in this country for an awfully long time. The aspiration of having a very short turnover in any centre must be held. I understand that the housing shortage is adding to the problems and that community welfare officers throughout the country are dealing proactively with those in direct provision who have their papers and wish to move on. The number of long-stay residents in the system has gone down. From 2015 to 2017 there was a reduction of 1,500 in the number of those in the system for more than three years. However, this should never have been allowed to occur in the first place. The system should have been reviewed five years after it came into existence, in 2005, or after ten years, in 2010. It was not until we had an agreement between Fine Gael and the Labour Party in 2014 that the system finally came to be reviewed and reformed properly.

The sentence was deleted from the programme for Government. I did not see any mention of it in the confidence and supply arrangement between Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. Unless I am greatly mistaken, I do not remember any mention of the matter in the campaign manifesto of our current Taoiseach, Deputy Varadkar, when he was telling the nation why he wanted to lead us. It is important to note that this House has consistently and constantly raised the issue on a cross-party basis, regardless of our political background. We are keeping it at the forefront of our minds. We want to engage with the Minister on the progress of the McMahon report. Mr. Justice Bryan McMahon is quite critical of the Government's inaction on the implementation of his report.

Again, I am aware the Minister found it extraordinary the last time when I pointed out that this report was not sent out to consultants, independently written and then handed back to Government. It was signed off on by Department officials and was negotiated between Department officials, who were members of the working group, and NGOs. Sometimes when a report has been done by an expert group and handed back to the Government, people can dismiss it as being too idealistic or ideological or not being in the real world. This report was negotiated and tossed back and forth. When it was signed off on, there was an expectation that it would be implemented to the letter. Any problem the Department may have had with any of the recommendations had already been addressed. Many of the NGOs put their reputations on the line in going with the report as they had a mandate to end direct provision, and although the report was very much less than that, they were willing to go with it because they expected it to be implemented in its entirety. One of the NGOs walked away. If I were a member of any of those NGOs who acted in good faith in respect of this report, I do not know if I would have the heart to deal with the Department of Justice and Equality again. Although there was trust that the situation would be improved, over two years later we are still debating how many of the recommendations have been brought to fruition.

Can we at least have the aspiration that nobody in the system will spend more than six months in a direct provision centre? Can we ensure that the long-stay residents are moved out of the system? I acknowledge that we have begun to roll out oversight, but can this be continued?Can we ensure that, when it comes to the report's implementation, we do not argue back and forth over what percentage of its recommendations has been implemented? The aspiration in what we are trying to achieve should not be a party political point-scoring exercise. Rather, it should be to achieve something for children in our care. Those children expect much better of the country of a hundred thousand welcomes.