Immigration Policy in Ireland

Activists who have been working in and around immigration in Ireland have been screaming about the system here and how broken it is for decades at this point. Direct Provision is a billion-euro industry. Anyone involved in accommodating Ukrainians will know the money involved. Take a look at this article in the Examiner, it's a few years old but I can't imagine much has really changed:

I would ask anyone who is angry about refugees being scroungers and "not working a day in their life (in Ireland)", only coming here for social welfare etc. - please read that article and see how much of your tax euros are actually being spent and where. Is it right that the government spend money like that on a broken system, or is it right that the most vulnerable in society get a few euro every week. What system has a more negative impact on Irish society? 

Asylum seekers and refugees have lived in horrific conditions in DP for years in spite of all that money in the industry (and it is an industry). The centres have been at capacity, adults living with children they don't know in the same rooms, this being flagged by the adults themselves because they're concerned for the welfare of these children. Kids going missing. Being given warmed up slop as food every day. Not allowed leave their accommodation. This article from the New Yorker, again a few years old, sums up the system well: 

https://www.newyorker.comews/dispatch/irelands-strange-cruel-system-for-asylum-seekers - https://www.newyorker.com/news/dispatch/irelands-strange-cruel-system-for-asylum-seekers

Processing times from the IPO are a disgrace, and it's sort of typical Irish governmental policy as they have been completely laissez-faire about it for years. happy out with DP because it's lining a few pockets and there hasn't been a public groundswell about it, with no care or thought given to 

a) the human beings being treated like sh*t and 

b) what happens if the numbers spike for some reason out of Ireland's control

Now we're at B. The war in Ukraine has caused a huge spike in numbers, and the system completely collapses as a result. As someone who has been talking about this for a long time, frankly I think it's great that there is finally talk about the system. What worries me is the government pandering to the fascist lunatics in some attempt to look "tough on immigration", words like "crackdown" and all the rest, totally missing the core source of these issues. As climate has more of an impact around the world, we're only going to see the numbers go up. So how do we build a system that welcomes people here, that looks after people who are seeking asylum legitimately, but key to this entire thing, is the processing times and how people are treated while waiting for a judgement on their applications to live here. People cannot simply sit in DP centres for decades because their appeal is at the bottom of a pile of other appeals. There has to be a more streamlined system to deal with appeals, a limit on the amount of appeals and some sort of time limit imposed - and not in a way that the State can run out the clock before deporting people. 

I do think many of the opinion polls only scratch the surface of what is bothering Irish people. If there were follow up questions and more detail, I would guess that most of the reasons behind people asking for tighter immigration or "Ireland agrees that we have too many immigrants" type headlines, is the same problems that have plagued us for decades - housing, health, public services. It's not the "single unvetted male of army age" who is taking away the ability for people to buy houses in their hometowns across the country. It's not the Ukrainian family fleeing war who has the hospital in Letterkenny in such a state that patients are "at risk of death" according to the consultants and GPs in Donegal just last October.

I also think the "open borders" and "flood of immigrants" narrative is not only far right lunacy and dangerous talk, it's wrong. I would ask people to read My Fourth Time We Drowned by Sally Hayden, or seek out a podcast she's been on talking about her book if you don't want to read it in full. What the EU are doing to "protect" it's borders is frankly disgraceful. I don't think there are many who would actually cheer on what is happening because of the EU Frontex agency and the concentration camps in Libya, no matter why many of these people are migrating. (As a side note, "economic migrants" is also a pet peeve phrase of mine. It makes the reason behind people migrating seem to be driven by pure greed. But what if a South Sudanese man has a pregnant wife and worries for her because South Sudan has the one of the highest infant, maternal and child mortality rates in the world? What if he wants to earn more money to try and pay for better healthcare for his wife and future child? Is that not a legitimate reason? But he will be classed an "economic migrant". It's bullsh*t.)

So I think it's totally legitimate for people to have issues with immigration policy in Ireland, to protest if they feel strongly enough about it. The system should absolutely change. As I said, what I worry about is the fascists co-opting these protests and this current focus on immigration. Pandering to the fascists by "cracking down" on immigration will not work. It will only make them bolder. No matter how tough the government gets on immigration, it won't be tough enough for these loopers. 

On the tourism point, if people aren't using the Valley and the Glenside is too far out then would the DHotel not be busy a lot of the time and therefore there would be no need for the owners to take the governments money to re-purpose the building for now?

Regarding 500 people coming into the town and as you say "some being scumbags and some not", how do you know that? Are you working on the law over averages? If so when they opened those new estates out where Southgate shopping centre now is and lots of people moved in then presumably you also had the same concerns about scumbags also?

You mention people coming from countries that show little respect towards women - Do those countries, for example, make single women who are pregnant go into homes to have their kids and make them give them up? That sort of thing? 

Yes, as has been pointed out above the system for IP applicants is far from perfect.

Yes, serious parts of public services in Ireland have be underfunded.

Yes, towns like Drogheda have been neglected.

But this has been the case for quite a while so it's curious that 500 IP applicants is all of a sudden the straw that broke the camels back. 

Greystones population went up three fold without any great increase in doctors or dentists, we got on fine. 

500 IP applicants isn't going to make a huge difference to those services in a town the size of Drogheda. 

Don’t think dentists are too much of an issue. Doctors certainly are. For example, my dad hadn’t been to a doctor in over 30 years so my family doctor had no record of him being there. Refused to see him as weren’t taking anymore patients. He rang around a number of doctors and they wouldn’t take him. I eventually got him into my own doctor after personally begging him!

Looking forward to 500 asylum seekers being dumped on the doorsteps of the left wing loonies. A lot of the previously vocal left wing in drogheda have been very quiet the last couple of days!

That's a Fianna Fail and Fine Gael problem. They caused it.

This is ultimately how opinions changed in Scandinavian countries. Went from the left to the right. When reality hits socially people realise that sustainable and realistic refugee systems should be a thing.