Addressing the latest u-turn by the Tánaiste Simon Harris Aontú leader and Meath West TD Peadar Tóibín stated,
“Simon Harris statement on the Asylum process is a significant u-turn from Fine Gael. Its an admission that government has gotten it wrong. Indeed Fine Gael had held the Ministry for Justice in the last government and during that time the asylum process was allowed to proceed in chaos. It as the actions of Helen McEntee which I believe has resulted in a system that is broken and has created a large level of frustration among the general public.
Aontú has always called for a system that does its best to provide shelter for those who are fleeing war and violence. But this is not what has happened. The latest series of parliamentary questions that I have received back on the asylum process still shows a chaotic system where the government still does not know what is happening.
Our PQs show the following data. The State is providing accommodation to almost 33,000 people who have applied for international protection. Accommodation is provided in over 320 centres nationwide. 18,074 people are waiting at the first application stage. 15,041 people are waiting at the International Protection Appeals Tribunal stage.
The length of time to process applications is still incredibly long. The median appeal time for appeal from applicants form safe countries is 12 months and the same figures for non safe countries is 15 months. This means that many many appeals are taking well over 2 years to process. Incredibly the Minister for Justice does not know how long it takes for a the hundreds of Judicial Reviews of failed applications or a failed appeals. The decision-making process has gone from €11m to €40m in 4 years. The government is often paying €615 for a single interview to be carried out. Retired Gardaí are often employed in this manner.
89% of all applicants for asylum apply at the International Protection Office. This is an issue that was first raised by Aontú. The Minister believes that a significant proportion of these cases enter from the north of Ireland. But he admits that he does not know for sure, as, incredibly, that information is still not collated in a structured way. This is shocking. Nothing has been done in any concrete way to prevent this from happening. There has been no effort to negotiate with the British government for passport checks for those who are travelling across the Irish sea. Stopping people on buses at the border and bring them back to Newry so that they can get a bus to Dublin is not a concrete solution.
There are still thousands of asylum applicants showing up at Dublin Airport without travel documents or on false travel documents. In 2024 3,370 flew from airports where they needed travel documents and arrived at Dublin Airport without travel documents or on false documents. When a non-EEA national presents at a port of entry without documents or is identified as having false documents they can be refused entry to the State. However the Minister admits to me that the vast majority of those who arrive in the country in this manner are allowed to remain by the state.
In 2024, there were 2,403 deportation orders signed. 934 people or 40% were given voluntary deportations. There are no exit checks. Therefore it is not possible to verify if these people left the country. This year so far, 2846 people received deportation orders. 8% or 235 people had their deportation orders enforced. This is a tiny figure. Deportation orders have only really started to happen in the last 2 years. In 2023 there were only 859 issued. In 2023 only 70 people had their deportation orders enforced.
Incredibly the Minister does not know how many asylum seekers working. The state is paying the rent of tens of thousands of people who are earning money. If a person has falsely applied or fraudulently applied for asylum, lived in state accommodation for years, earning a salary for years, there is no charge for rent or fine imposed.
There is a frustration amongst many people in Ireland as to the chaotic nature of the government asylum process. Most people want a system that tries to help those who really need help but most people what a strict system that can’t be abused. The government’s system is being abused. Refusal rates for first time asylum applications are at 80%. That’s an incredibly high number. Many people are outstaying their deportation orders. Many are destroying their travel documents to make staying in the country easier. All this has a cost. The cost of IPAS accommodation is €1.25billion this year. Another cost of the mismanagement of this process is the threat to the cohesion of our society.
IPAS centres are still exempt from planning permission. We in Aontú are currently drafting a Bill which will change this and return IPAS to the democratic oversight of planning law. The Tánaiste may be having a late realisation as to the extent of the problem but there is little concrete evidence that there will be change”.
