Sharon Keogan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for coming to the House.

This is a conversation I have been requesting for some time. I have worked very hard since March last year in my local community where I have been personally involved in the cases of perhaps 900 people who have come to east Meath. I know at first hand the difficulties the Minister is dealing with.

I am glad we are having this debate. Hopefully, it is a watershed moment and we will be able to have these discussions more regularly in future, giving them the time and attention they need until they are resolved or we are at least out of the crisis.

I take issue slightly with the heading of today's statements. It seems a tad limited. We cannot talk about accommodation of any one group in this country without appreciating the wider housing context. Of course, those applying for international protection are not the only ones looking for accommodation. I trust we will be allowed to touch on these points too.

On the issue of terminology, some of us can get tied up with definitions when it comes to migration issues. International protection applicants are, in common parlance, asylum seekers, while beneficiaries of temporary protection are persons who have presented at our borders in possession of Ukrainian documents and have been afforded protection under the EU's temporary protection directive adopted following the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia. A further division is as follows. Some of those on the left wing seem to believe that once somebody applies for asylum they are entitled to it, that all persons applying for international protection do so genuinely and that any hesitation on the part of the State to grant them full access and benefits is xenophobic. This is nonsense. No country has a duty to accept all asylum seekers who present at its borders. We have a duty to examine applications, appraise them fairly and separate the genuine applicants from the others. The question we must ask is what constitutes a genuine applicant. When I use the word "genuine", I do not do so in the strict or official sense. The Department of Justice has a litany of tests which are used in the examination of applications and I will not go into those. I mean to ask what a genuine asylum seeker is in the mind of the public. We might think of someone fleeing war, famine or persecution, someone who has removed themselves or their family from immediate danger or someone who would die, be killed or suffer extreme hardship were they to return. This is generally what the public views as a genuine asylum seeker.

However, not all asylum seekers come to our shores fleeing such circumstances. Some come from merely poor countries, in the knowledge that they have a better chance of earning more money and enjoying a higher standard of living in Ireland than they do in their home countries. While these people are technically asylum seekers, they are better described as economic migrants. They have moved to this country to improve their economic prospects, nothing more and nothing less. Most sane people are of the opinion that our duty to these people is lower than the duty we have towards persons fleeing war and persecution. I am one of these people. While I admire the gumption and attitude of self-preservation of those who uproot and move country to better their lot in life, we simply do not owe economic migrants the same level of provision and protection as we do other cohorts of people in need of such.