Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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617. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth when his Department started to write to people with status/leave to remain in Direct Provision centres giving them dates by which they would have to leave the direct provision centre or be moved to another centre; the number of such letters issued to date; the criteria for issuing such letters; the rationale for this policy; the number of people who have been moved on foot of these letters; and a breakdown of these moves, including information on from where and to where people have been moved. [33884/23]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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The International Protection Accommodation Service (IPAS) currently accommodates over 5,300 people that have been granted status (Refugee/Subsidiary Protection/Leave to Remain). As those with status have had their application for International Protection determined, they are no longer considered applicants and therefore no longer entitled to Material Reception Conditions.

When first granted status by the Department of Justice, IPAS writes individually to all those accommodated in IPAS accommodation and advises them of the supports available to them from Peter McVerry Trust and DePaul, and that they must now actively look to progress from IPAS accommodation into the community.

These organisations have been contracted by the Department to provide onsite support to those no longer eligible for IPAS accommodation to aid their integration and progress into the community. Since January 2022, over 1,600 people with status have moved on from IPAS accommodation.

Those with status for the greatest length of time, who have not moved on, are offered a transfer to alternative emergency accommodation so that those currently still in the International Protection process can be accommodated in IPAS Centres where they can receive supports.

Those currently being offered this transfer have had status for at least 18 months, if single, and over 3 years if part of a family unit. 365 such letters have issued to these households since September 2022.

33 households have taken this offer of alternative emergency accommodation at the following locations; Treacys Hotel, Co. Monaghan; Knockalisheen, Co. Clare; Kildbride Army Barracks, Co. Wicklow; Lakelands Scariff, Co. Clare; and Buncrana, Co. Donegal.

Those that took the offers of accommodation came from IPAS accommodation in Cork, Dublin, Meath, Kildare, Sligo, Limerick, Wicklow, Clare, Waterford, Westmeath, Mayo and Waterford.