Colette Kelleher (Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Minister of State and I worked together very closely on many things and agree on many things. We disagree, unfortunately, about the means but not the end of how we get to being decent to people in trouble all over the world. Despite overwhelming evidence about the merits of keeping refugee families together, the Government has limited opportunities for family reunions set out in law. Changes resulting from the International Protection Act may be unintended consequences too and have meant that only a very restricted category of family member can apply to be reunited - essentially, spouses, parents of minor children and children under the age of 18. The restrictions of the International Protection Act are having a devastating impact on people. I know that from the work I know through Nasc in Cork, the Irish Refugee Council, Oxfam and others. However, we have an opportunity today to right this wrong. I am seeking to amend the International Protection Act which is failing a great many people. I am seeking to return to the provisions that were enshrined in Ireland's Refugee Act 1996. I am hardly proposing revolution or radicalism. It is legislation that was more flexible, more able to respond to the realities of international refugee crises such as we find ourselves in today, and more fit to protect and respect the rights of all refugees who would seek a safe haven in Ireland.

Some of the reasons that have been given by Government for its opposition to the International Protection (Family Reunification) (Amendment) Bill, do not stack up. I disagree that the Bill is unquantifiable. When the Refugee Act 1996 was in force, which is all that we want to go back to, the number of people applying in Ireland was relatively low. We were given misleading information about the average numbers of family members applied for under the reunification provisions of the Refugee Act. We were told that the average number of family members applied for was 20 and the largest application was for more than 70 family members. I checked the facts from the information given by the Department of Justice and Equality when referring to eligible family members. It is important to compare like with like.I accept the Minister's point that the Department did not provide that figure but if one extrapolates from the figures provided it is about two people. For the purposes of this Bill I am talking about eligible family members. The number of eligible family members applying is borne out by Nasc, which says it is approximately two to three people from its perspective and the UNHCR says it is between three and four. Those figures were put on the record at the European Migration Network conference last November. The Government said it would introduce a new temporary scheme of family reunification - the humanitarian admissions programme - which would do away with the need for the family reunification Bill.

The humanitarian admissions programme is very welcome and complementary to the family reunification Bill but the humanitarian admissions programme is a temporary scheme with narrow parameters, a two-year life span and it is limited to people living in UNHCR-established conflict zones. We know there are people in trouble who live outside of those zones whom we would seek to help. The humanitarian admissions programme is fundamentally different from an amendment to legislation which would place family reunification on a statutory footing. We are still waiting to hear more detail about the humanitarian admissions programme from the Government.

The family reunification Bill is not open ended, as was charged by the Government. The Bill is well defined and focuses on family members who are "dependent on the qualified person or is suffering from a mental or physical disability to such an extent that it is not reasonable for him or her to maintain himself or herself". The resources or a money message obstacle should not apply or be used to block this Bill as resources have already been allocated by Government for this area of public policy and international commitments, which we are missing.

Which of us if we, by accident of birth, country or region, had to flee for our very lives, leave our beloved families, our country and home and by some miracle reached a safe shore, would not wish to reunite with our families especially if they needed us and were unable to fend for themselves? Last week I witnessed many acts of random kindness to strangers in the snow. Men and women from the ambulance service and the Army carried a woman in her late 80s who had a turn down a steep and snowy hill to hospital. It is Ireland's turn now do some "lifting up" of people. People are depending on us to do the right thing.