I thank the Chairman for the opportunity to appear before the committee to address issues regarding the reception and housing of asylum seekers and refugees. I apologise for the late submission of the documents, which members may not have had time to read in full. While I will not repeat what is in the document and would welcome any questions arising from it, I wish to draw attention to a few points. The way in which Mr. Rory O'Neill and I will divide up the subject is that I will speak about the initial reception of asylum seekers and refugees and he then will deal with the issues relating to the transition of people once they get their papers or of those who are moving from the initial reception centres for refugees.
I will start with a story because it helps to illustrate the reality we are discussing. Two days ago, I spent a couple of hours with a young man in his late 20s from a country that is well known in the news at present for giving rise to refugees. I spent time with him because he was in Dublin for an interview in connection with his asylum claim that was to take place the day after. He had come to Dublin the day before because he would not otherwise have been able to make it in time for a 9 a.m. interview. It was the second time I had met him and as I spent time with him, he spoke to me and showed me photographs of his home, of people with whom he went to university and of his wife and their daughter. We spoke about what had led him to leave - it was all of his own volition - and his hopes that, eventually, he will be able to get his papers here. He has been here for a relatively short period, and he wants to bring his wife and daughter to join him because he is feeling very isolated. The emphasis of the point he was making to me or that came across was that while he hopes to get his refugee status quite soon and then to be able to bring his wife and daughter, the problem will be that he is in a direct provision centre. They will not be able to live with him in that centre. He studied English literature at university, is already well aware of the housing situation here and wonders how long it will be before he is able to get accommodation that would facilitate him being reunited with his wife and daughter. This is one reason this housing situation is so key to people who are expected to get refugee status and to make Ireland their home.
However, I wish to mention another factor pertaining to him, which is that I met him again on the day after. I took him to the direct provision centre in Dublin at which he was staying the night before, accommodation having been arranged for him, and asked him how he got on. He replied that he had not slept. He had been put into a room with two other people he had never met before who were from different countries and who already had been living there for a while. The accommodation simply did not suit him that well.
He had a roof over his head and a bed to sleep on, but this was before probably the most important interview that he was due to have. The thing we forget about direct provision and the accommodation of asylum seekers is that accommodation is part of an important process. Unless one is accommodated in a place that enables a person to engage properly with that process, a wrong decision can be made.
Two weeks ago, I met with someone who after eight years has finally had a decision on his refugee appeal. That is the first of three applications in this country.
I want to touch on one other thing, which is already on the public record. There is a group at a mosque in Dublin, the Dublin Islamic Foundation of Ireland, which has requested access to Muslim refugees in an emergency reception and orientation centre in Monasterevin in County Kildare. The reply on record to that from the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Frances Fitzgerald, given on 17 May, indicates the restrictions they put in place for the purposes of protection of privacy. There is a statement in that reply, however, which is fundamentally wrong. I want to read that statement. It says: "It is required under law to protect the identity of refugees." That is not true. Section 19 of the Refugee Act 1996, which is still in force, and section 26 of the International Protection Act 2015, due to come into force in July, refer to protecting the identity of applicants under the Acts. In addition, the 2015 Act refers to those who have been applicants under the Act.
Refugees being transferred from Jordan to Lebanon have never applied under any Act in this country. They are being brought in, already recognised as refugees. Therefore, the newer refugees who are coming to these emergency reception and orientation centres are wrongly being denied the opportunity for greater integration with local communities. The reason the mosque sought an approach was because Ramadan is coming up and they want to help facilitate those people in having access to wider Muslim groups. I just wanted to put those two things on record.
Let me now come to other issues. Anything that we say is already in full knowledge of the difficulties that are being faced by people already in the country who are seeking housing or have been made homeless. One of the things that the homelessness situation has drawn attention to is the fact that others, such as teachers, are beginning to speak out about the impact quite soon on children of being in hotels, and not having the privacy or space they need. Yet, generally, this is the situation that asylum seekers have been facing for many years.
As we say in the first line of our presentation, being a refugee is the most extreme form of loss of home and displacement. It is the ultimate in homelessness. They are in a country they do not know, separated from family who themselves may be spread in many other countries. Since last September, a two-tier system has developed in Ireland, and there is a danger in that. We are beginning to see people fleeing wars, the real refugees, and the others who come for other reasons or from countries that are not so prominent in the news, such as South Sudan and Burundi, as perhaps not being as entitled to protection as refugees. That is wrong in itself because refugee status can arise, for example, because of sexual orientation.
Because we are focusing on what the EU is doing, with an emphasis of course upon Syria for obvious reasons, given the numbers who have fled and are now fleeing that country, we have two systems. We have a direct provision system for people who come of their own volition and claim asylum. We also have the emergency reception and orientation centres and further resettlements for those being brought into the country either from Jordan and Lebanon as recognised refugees, or relocated from Greece and Italy.
Ireland made a commitment to take about 4,000 either by way of resettlement or relocation. So far, a family of ten have come from Greece but more are in the pipeline to be relocated from Greece and Italy. The difference therefore is quite stark between those in direct provision and those in the emergency reception and orientation centres. I will touch on that a little more when it comes up.
The direct provision centres are overseen by the Reception and Integration Agency, RIA, which is part of the Department of Justice and Equality. RIA's website states it "seeks to ensure that the material needs of residents, in the period during which their applications for international protection are being processed, are met." RIA continues to accommodate people post protection application, as well as those who have a deportation order against them but have not yet been removed from the country. To some degree, it reduces homelessness.
As I indicated in my story at the beginning of my submission on accommodation for those awaiting a decision on an asylum claim, it is not just their material needs which need to be met. It is not just a question of a roof over one's head or food in one's belly. I asked a young man in an accommodation centre about the food there. He goes for one of the three meals a day. He already knows a bit about Ireland and joked he is already integrating well into Ireland as he sometimes just eats potato because he has got a taste for them. Often, he does not like the food, however. Both direct provision centres and emergency reception and orientation centres share characteristics with accommodation for homeless people where residents lack autonomy, control, privacy, security and the ability to engage properly with friends or people from the community.
RIA has given us up-to-date statistics, which are not available publicly due to staff shortages. These show more than 600 people have been in direct provision for more than eight years, 13.4% of the total population of direct provision centres. These centres comprise hotels, chalets and mobile homes. More than 1,500 people, one third of the population of direct provision centres, have been in direct provision for more than three years. The average length of stay in direct provision centres is 38 months. This has a significant impact when it comes to people moving on.
The post of a Minister for integration has not existed since the previous Government came into power in March 2011. There are no plans for the integration of asylum seekers. Whatever status they get, many of these people will remain in Ireland. To a degree we are building problems for the future because we are not providing them with the support to move on, whatever length of time they have spent in the system. RIA’s title is, therefore, misleading because the integration element of the agency’s remit has not existed since 2007. Nearly ten years on, no one is addressing the integration of asylum seekers. In addition, on 28 March 2014, the Minister for Justice and Equality announced a review of Ireland’s approach to the integration of migrants. We have yet to see the publication of that integration policy. To be fair, the interdepartmental group conducting the review took submissions on the matter. While it may yet come, it still has not happened. Accordingly, we have not seen whether there will be an attempt to integrate a significant population with varied needs.
To date, two emergency reception and orientation centres have been opened, one in Monasterevin, County Kildare, owned by existing direct provision centre owners, and one in Dungarvan, County Waterford, owned by a company not previously involved with asylum seekers and refugees. Orientation takes place between eight to ten weeks before people are moved to more long-term accommodation. One group is about to go to Kerry. Mayo County Council has announced a group will go to Mayo. There are plans to move some to Limerick and some have already gone to Mallow, County Cork.
The exception with that group is that there was no real provision of support for it. The committee will have heard more about their stories in the news because when they linked up with local people, some of the information about the process came out and the way they were beginning to adapt to life in Mallow.
An unfortunate feature, which is reflected in the answer to those parliamentary questions, relates to the Office for the Promotion of Migrant Integration, which oversees settled refugees and the relocation of asylum seekers from Greece and Italy. While the office's title clearly relates to the promotion of integration, unfortunately, it has taken secrecy and privacy to a new level to the extent that access is exceptionally difficult for people who want to engage with those new communities and enable them to begin to learn what life in Ireland is like. I made an application for the Irish Refugee Council to join forces with a very large company - during its charity month - in order to spend a day or part of a day at one of these two centres. I have been informed that the request has gone to the principal officer at the Office for the Promotion of Migrant Integration. That is not something that needs to be dealt with by a principal officer. It can be dealt with if people in these centres are properly trained. Of course, one does not want people going into the centres who will abuse and attack others but individuals who are offering a welcome, as we have seen in other countries, should not be set back and rendered unable to offer the support that is needed, including companies that are doing it as part of their corporate social responsibility.
I will deal briefly with the recommendations on page 4. We have made a recommendation that, in respect of the Reception and Integration Agency and the Office for the Promotion of Migrant Integration, the resettlement of refugees should be moved from the Department of Justice and Equality to the new Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government. I may be wrong but I assume that the housing needs of everyone else who has made submissions to or is due to come before the committee are probably being dealt with by this new Department. Why would we, therefore, separate this group of people and put them under the remit of the Department of Justice and Equality? I do not know if the Taoiseach has made announcements about the new junior ministries. I know one of them was due to relate to housing. Clearly, this is a prime issue, hence the existence of this committee. Therefore, why not move responsibility for the housing of asylum seekers and refugees to that Department, particularly as it includes local government, which is key to the integration of these refugees who have been resettled around the country?
The second recommendation relates to the integration strategy that has been in the pipeline since March 2014. It would be good to see a commitment to publish it and, of course, to include asylum seekers within it. We also recommend phasing out direct provision along the lines we have previously proposed. We have created a link, which members will only be able to see in the electronic version, to a second proposal regarding what reception for asylum seekers should be. The first proposal was made in 2011. The proposal before the committee dates from December 2013. It sets out what an alternative reception system for asylum seekers should be. That document addresses quite a number of points and I will leave it for members' attention.
Finally, we recommend that companies and organisations which receive public funding should be required to operate transparently to bring about proper accountability. Paragraph 2.1 on page 2 relates to the 35 centres across 16 counties. The largest of these companies with capacity to accommodate more than one third of direct provision residents are registered as unlimited rather than limited liability companies. Therefore, they do not have to file publicly accessible returns with the Companies Registration Office. Of course, if it is a private business, it is entitled to some degree of privacy but huge amounts of public money are being put into direct provision. On average, we have calculated that approximately €48,000 would be provided per year to accommodate and support a family of four in one of these direct provision centres. How much of that could be used to allow that person to live in a community or at least give them greater autonomy and control by living in units where they are able to cook?
I would have thought that it was a basic principle that public money should only go to companies where there is some ability to see how it is being used and how much is being used for the benefit of the people they are accommodating. That is, therefore, a further recommendation that we make. I have taken more time than I wanted but if there is time, Mr. O'Neill will briefly address-----
