Cathy Bennett (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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16. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the projected annual cost for Ireland of participation in the EU Pact on Asylum and Migration for each of the next five years, broken down by current and capital expenditure, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [36668/25]

Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
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It is a central priority for me as Minister for Justice that our immigrations laws are robust and enforced.

The EU Migration and Asylum Pact is a new EU framework to manage migration and asylum for the long-term. The overall objective of the Pact is to provide a fair, sustainable and efficient asylum procedure. This will be done through convergence in asylum practises across the EU.

Ireland’s national implementation plan sets out the State’s proposed approach to meeting the requirements set out in the Pact. It is not a binding prescription, but rather an indication of how Ireland intends to go about implementing the Pact.

The plan allows for a transition period before the Pact comes into effect in June 2026 during which elements can be examined in greater detail and modified as required. This includes operational aspects as well as resource requirements around human resources, IT, infrastructure and so on.

The plan sets out an ambition to have a maximum 9-month processing period for applicants in the international protection system, which would greatly reduce the cost to the State. The delivery of State-owned beds through the State’s Comprehensive Accommodation Strategy will also reduce the cost of accommodation.

The plan also contains indicative cost modelling estimating potential capital set up costs, post implementation non-pay costs and the cost of new staff required from June 2026. The cost model varies based on a range of possible number of applications per annum.

In the short term, the cost to the State will increase as two parallel legislative systems will operate for some time. However, in the medium to long-term this investment will show a return in the form of decreasing annual costs because of the improved, faster processing it will enable, thereby reducing the time an applicant remains in the system, with significant accommodation and other costs.

The estimated costs for running all aspects of the Department's asylum and immigration services will be set out in the annual Estimates for 2026 and subsequent years on an annual basis in the normal fashion.