David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am referring to people in the EU illegally. There are similar impacts on Northern Ireland and the common travel area, including North-South and east-west impacts, which would need to be carefully considered. Amending immigration law has wide-ranging implications and benefits from a detailed analysis of the implications, including broad consultation with all impacted parties and the NGO community. To consider such a fundamental change to our citizenship laws without engaging in such consultation is not an approach that this Government can accept. I reiterate that the Government is open to a considered discussion on the issues but cannot accept a Bill that has been drafted in the absence of such a discussion. We need to discuss this seriously but, in accordance with the reasons I have put forward, the Government cannot support this Bill. We are happy to discuss what we can do to assist people in the situations referred to earlier.

The Minister's discretion only comes into play when the individual has failed all independent vetting of their right to be here or have avoided compliance with the many legal pathways available to live and work here. Senator Clifford-Lee mentioned the McMahon report and 98% of its recommendations have been completed. We have all started on the recast directive, the conditions of which are liberal, and we are encouraging people in the asylum protection process to apply for work where they are eligible to do so. It is difficult to match the people who have a right to work with jobs but I am examining ways to do that because it will benefit people. We have been working hard to improve the accommodation people are offered. There has been increased demand in recent weeks for people looking for protection so we are trying to open other places. In response to Senator Dolan's point, all children from Poland, Lithuania and so on have full EU rights here.

This is a serious issue, which deserves serious consideration. We have only had the Bill for less than a week but, even in that time, we have highlighted matters of major concern, as I have outlined.I am really interested in debating this further to see how we can explore these issues but unfortunately the Bill as presented is not amendable and is not workable in our view.