Jonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein)
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42. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality if he will establish a time bound scheme with transparent criteria to regularise the position of undocumented migrants here. [32687/17]

Charles Flanagan (Laois, Fine Gael)
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There are no plans to introduce a general regularisation scheme for those who are currently illegally in the State. Any such proposal could give rise to very large, unpredictable and potentially very costly impacts across the full range of public and social services, particularly as there may well be significant implications for the operation of the Common Travel Area, in the context of Britain withdrawing from the European Union. Any proposal in this regard would have to be very carefully considered.

In addition, at the European level, Ireland together with the other Member States of the European Union has committed under the European Pact on Immigration and Asylum agreed at the European Council in October 2008 "to use only case-by-case regularisation, rather than generalised regularisation, under national law, for humanitarian or economic reasons". While the Pact is not legally binding, the political commitment among Member States, then and now, is clearly against any form of process that would in any way legitimise the status of those unlawfully present without first examining the merits of their individual cases.

Ireland operates a very open immigration policy with many legal pathways open to non-EEA nationals to legally enter and reside in the State. The Deputy will appreciate that, in most cases, a person becomes undocumented through their own actions either by entering the state illegally in the first place or by deciding not to leave the State when they no longer have a valid immigration permission. Such persons are always free to present their case, on its own merits, to the immigration authorities and it is reasonable for the State to expect that the persons concerned would respect the final decision.

I will, of course, give proper consideration to the Report on Immigration, Asylum and the Refugee Crisis published by the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Justice and Equality on 29 June 2017. In particular I will examine if elements of the recommendations can be acted upon, having regard to our international commitments and the domestic implications that any general amnesty or regularisation might entail.

The Deputy may also wish to note that the Economic and Research Institute (ESRI) recently published a study on the illegal employment of non-EEA nationals. It is important to stress that the study examined the situation of both those who had no immigration permission to be in the State and those who were working in breach of an immigration permission which might exclude or limit their access to the labour market. The ESRI concluded that there was no reliable data on the numbers of persons undocumented or illegally employed in Ireland. They did, however, identify certain characteristics of this group and concluded that the areas at high risk of illegal employment and being undocumented, include; the catering sector (such as takeaway, fast food and ethnic restaurants) and those working in the private home involved in child and elder care. The report also points to the enforcement work of the Workplace Relations Commission and the Garda National Immigration Bureau with particular focus on employers who engage in employing and potentially exploiting illegal workers.