Brian O'Shea
Ceist:53 Mr. O'Shea asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the progress, if any, which has been made on the full implementation of the Refugee Act, 1996; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3006/98]
Written Answers. - Refugee Act.
Thomas P. Broughan
Ceist:84 Mr. Broughan asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the measures, if any, he has taken to ensure the speedy implementation of the Refugee Act, 1996; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3208/98]
John Gormley
Ceist:96 Mr. Gormley asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform if he will establish an independent commission to deal with the processing of applications for asylum of refugees to the country. [3004/98]
Liz McManus
Ceist:120 Ms McManus asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform if the working group to consider the question of an amnesty for asylum seekers has reported; if so, the conclusions of the group; the steps, if any, that will be taken to regularise the position of asylum seekers in the State; the steps, if any, that are being taken to expedite the full implementation of all provisions of the Refugee Act, 1996, in view of the motion passed by Dáil Éireann on 16 December 1997 urging the earliest possible implementation of the Act; if the State has yet filed a defence of the legal challenge to the proposed age limit for the post of Refugee Commissioner; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3114/98]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 53, 84, 96 and 120 together.
Having given careful consideration to the matter, I have decided not to proceed with the implementation of the remaining sections of the Refugee Act, 1996 at present.
A whole-time refugee applications commissioner would finalise, on average, about six cases per day, 1,200 cases per annum. With more than 4,000 cases currently on hands and the present intake pointing to a further 3,000 plus applications this year it is clear that the backlog would mount at an unacceptable rate. International experience is that between 8 per cent and 10 per cent of applicants are recognised as refugees. Even assuming for this country a recognition rate at first instance as high as 25 per cent, it can be expected that most negative recommendations of a commissioner would be appealed. Most of those appellants will seek an oral hearing. If one assumes that the commissioner bottleneck is removed, this would run to an estimated 3,000 appeals in a year: a workload for the Refugee Appeal Board of 15 hearings per working day. Assuming that each hearing took at minimum one hour, the daily average throughput for a full-time board could be no more than four or five appeals.
It is clear that the implementation of the Act as it stands would not improve matters from the point of view of applicants or the State.
As the Deputies will be aware, I received Government approval last year for an additional 72 staff to be recruited to work on asylum related duties in my Department. I am happy to be able to advise the Deputies that the industrial relations difficulties which were holding up the recruitment of this staff have now been resolved. Steps are under way to put this additional cohort of staff in place as soon as possible.
The priority, as I see it, is to clear the backlog and provide a mechanism for speedy decisions. The new arrangements for processing claims which were introduced on 10 December last, following extensive consultations with the UNHCR, will, I am satisfied, bring about an improvement in the position, not just in fairness to those who have applied for refugee status who are entitled to a speedy decision but also to the taxpayer who must support applicants and their families while a decision is pending. These new arrangements are an interim measure for processing applications for refugee status and provide for an appeal to an independent person —a barrister or solicitor of 10 years' standing.
I intend to review the Refugee Act, 1996 on an ongoing basis to establish at what point it might be possible to bring the remainder of the Act into operation or whether amendment might be necessary.
An interdepartmental working group has been considering a range of matters relevant to the issue of asylum seekers and the problem of illegal immigration. The committee is finalising its report and I expect to be able to bring it before Government shortly.
In so far as the issue of the legal challenge to the filling of the post of refugee applications commissioner is concerned, I understand that the Chief State Solicitor is in the process of drawing up the defence following consultations with the relevant Government Departments.