(Mayo): I wish to share time with Deputy Durkan.
Adjournment Debate. - Deportation of Romanian Family.
Is that agreed? Agreed.
(Mayo): Aurel and Sylvia Costina are decent, honest people. They came here five years ago hoping to make Ireland their permanent residence. They did things the right way. They applied for political asylum but were refused. Again, they did things the right way. They appealed against the decision but the appeal was turned down last year. Again, they did things the right way. Last January they wrote to the Minister and begged to be allowed to stay on humanitarian grounds. The Minister had executive power to accede to their request. Not alone did they not receive a reply to their plea but the treatment meted out to them on the instructions of the Minister and the Department was degrading and humiliating.
We like to think of ourselves, as seen through the eyes of outsiders, as being models of fairness and civility but the manner in which this husband and wife and their children were arrested in a dawn swoop at 6.45 a.m. smacked of the tactics which characterised the Gestapo. There was no advance notice and they were not served with a deportation order. There was a knock on the door, they were told to pack their bags, that they were being deported that afternoon. Even if they were to be deported, they were entitled to be treated with dignity and respect. To put them in a cell and leave them behind bars for four and a half hours was reminiscent of the treatment one could have expected from the tyranny of the regime which ruled their native Romania not so long ago.
Why was their initial application turned down in 1994, particularly given that Mr. Costina's brother and his family and Mrs. Costina's brother and his family were allowed to stay and given work permits? Why was their appeal turned down last year? Why did the Minister not reply to their plea to exercise his prerogative to permit them to stay on humanitarian grounds? Why, since the Department knew where they lived, was the deportation order not served on them personally? Why has the Minister not put in place a properly structured administrative system that is fair, open, transparent and efficient to deal with the sensitive area of asylum-seeking in a dignified way?
I welcome that the family is being given another opportunity to appeal for permission to remain but it should not have reached this stage. Their initial application should have been granted. These are people who have a positive contribution to make to life here, if they were only given a chance. Mr. Costina is an engineer. He would like to work but is not allowed to do so. Mrs. Costina is a woman of considerable character and ability. The boys have integrated so well that they would be very much at home on Hill 16 on Leinster final day. This family should be relieved of their anxiety and apprehension now. They should be told that their appeal is being granted and they are also entitled to an apology.
The circumstances surrounding the arrest of the Costina family and their detention is something that Irish people find deeply shocking. For the first time we have revealed to us the secret and subterranean world in which families are woken in the early hours of the morning and disappear by the will of the authorities out of the country. For the first time the reality of deportation has been brought into the open and it is not a pretty sight. In this case the family were told without warning that they were being deported. I understand there was some confusion regarding deportation papers but that does not alter what happened. While it ensured a reprieve for this distraught and terrified family it also raises questions concerning the validity of the procedures in this case and the arrest of the Costina family.
Three members of the family were woken early in the morning in their own home by members of the Garda Síochána. One son was staying with relatives and was not in the house. They were told to get dressed and were not paid the normal courtesies. No privacy was permitted. They were brought to Store Street Garda Station where they were locked in a holding cell. They were not given access to toilet facilities and were only released when they had signed a statement agreeing to leave the country within days. If such a thing happened to a settled family of Irish people abroad we would be in uproar. We must recognise that this is an Irish family. They are part of our community. During the almost five years they have been living here they have put down roots, made friendships, earned respect in their local community and their children have undergone their formative education in Ireland. Ireland is now their home. These boys talk and look like Dubliners, they dress like Irish boys of their own age and play the same sports. After growing up in this city they are, in effect, Dubliners. The parents have education and skills that would enable them to work here if they were given a chance. Aurel is an engineer and a topographer. There is no shortage of work for people like that. They would not be a burden on the State and they are highly spoken of by school principals and teachers, the local clergy and members of the community. They have shown their capability to integrate already. Indeed, there has been quite an extraordinary coming together of opinion in the neighbourhood giving evidence that they would be valued and would be able to support themselves if given a chance.
I welcome Mr. and Mrs. Costina to the Public Gallery. They have a right to be here to hear this debate. They are not alone but are surrounded by friends who have come with them to show solidarity. This is the kind of welcome and support they have received since they came to this country.
While their application for asylum was refused the family were always given hope and expected that they would eventually be permitted to stay here. The Minister's change of heart and agreement to reopen the case would be an opportunity to show the same humanity that this family has experienced.
I thank the media for highlighting this case because we must remember that this family are not alone. A total of 51 people have been deported already under escort. This term is a Department euphemism for forcible deportation. Many of these could be as deserving as the Costina family. We will never know. However, we can presume that at least some of them are as deserving. I have heard disturbing reports of a man who was sent back to Algeria and subsequently lost his life there. I ask the Minister to investigate that matter.
Finally, when Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats voted down the Private Members Bill I tabled earlier this year to provide an amnesty for asylum seekers, some of whom had been here for many years, I warned that tragic cases like this would be the outcome of the harsh approach of the Minister. I do not believe the majority of Irish people want to see families who have put down roots here and who are able and willing to make a contribution to Irish society being booted out of the country in secrecy in the early hours of the morning. I ask the Minister to suspend deportations and to look at alternatives in the spirit that reflects the support that exists for this unfortunate family whose only desire is to live and work among us.
I understand the Minister was prepared to give two minutes of his time to Deputy Brian Lenihan. A predecessor in the chair, Deputy Treacy, ruled that it was not appropriate for a Minister to share time, a view I hold myself. If the House is agreeable, I will allow Deputy Lenihan two minutes independent of the Minister's time. Agreed.
I am obliged to the Chair and to Members for affording me an opportunity to say a few words on this subject. I do not wish to dwell on the events of the past except to record my opinion that whatever orders the Minister has made in the matter must be invalid as a result of the conduct of the officers charged with their enforcement. Therefore, the Minister may take a fresh look at the matter.
As the only Deputy here who represents the constituency in which the family reside I join with other Deputies in confirming the testimonies that have been given for them in the House. They are a highly regarded family and have deep roots in the community. They have two children who are participating in the Irish education system. They have been here for four years and ten months and have not in any way come to the attention of the authorities. In those unique circumstances, I appeal to the Minister to exercise whatever residual discretion he has in their favour.
I would like to thank Deputies Higgins and McManus and Deputy Brian Lenihan for raising this matter on the Adjournment and giving us an opportunity to discuss an issue which has been very prominent in media reports over the past number of day. Ordinarily, I would be reluctant to discuss in the House or in any other public forum the asylum application or immigration status of identifiable individuals. However, in the present case it would appear that the family in question have opted to air this whole matter in public and in these circumstances I consider that I am entitled to respond. I will set out the salient facts of this case.
The family came to the State in January 1994, arriving at Shannon Airport from Havana, Cuba. On arrival they, together with two other related families, sought asylum. In 1995, the then Minister of State at the Department of Justice, Ms Joan Burton, rejected their asylum application following consultation with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. In the communication received from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees it was noted that the family had been issued with travel documents at the Romanian embassy in Havana for their return journey to Bucharest. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees stated that in view of the ease with which they obtained the new passports in Cuba and for other reasons it was the opinion of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees that none of the issues raised by the family gave rise to a claim for refugee status as defined in the Geneva Convention.
The applicants then appealed the decision of the Minister of State, Deputy Burton, and this was decided on 2 September 1997 by an independent appeals authority. I will deal later with the inaction by the previous Government which gave rise to this delay. This authority concluded that the applicants had failed to give any substantial evidence of persecution. He noted that the applicants' two children had returned to Romania on holiday. The independent authority further stated that it appeared in the course of the evidence before him that the applicants had been issued with a passport by the Romanian Consul in Dublin. The appeal authority decided that the applicants had not justified their claim for refugee status. I accepted the appeal authority's conclusion. To apply for a travel document or passport at the embassy of the country which is allegedly persecuting the applicant has to be seen as inconsistent with the asylum claim.
In January of this year the family was advised that their appeal had failed and that they had 14 days to either leave the State voluntarily or make representations to me as to why they should not be deported. In late January, a response was received from the solicitors. Essentially, they sought permission for the family to remain here on a number of grounds. The first was that they had relatives in the State who had been allowed to remain on the basis of having Irish born children; the second was that they had two children who had been here for four years and were attending school, the older child being on the verge of doing his leaving certificate; the third was that the family were of good character and had made many friends in their local area and were anxious to make a contribution to Irish society, and the fourth was that Romanian nationals had a right of establishment under an association agreement with the EU.
As regards the fourth ground, no application to exercise this right of establishment was subsequently made by the family. My Department wrote to the solicitors seeking to establish when the older son was due to sit the leaving certificate and on 1 May the solicitors confirmed that it was in 1999, not 1998. The file was submitted to me in late August 1998. I considered that the grounds advanced by the family for its application to remain in the State were not sufficient to warrant a positive decision on my part. The fact that the man and woman each had brothers in the State is not a sufficient consideration in the context of family reunification. The children had spent some years in school here and the family was said to be of good character and both of these considerations are significant in any such application, but they were not decisive.
In general the circumstances of the case are not such as to distinguish it from a number of others by reference to its humanitarian dimension. Accordingly, I signed the deportation order on 31 August 1998. This order, together with travel documents and custody warrants, was forwarded to the Garda on 20 October 1998 for implementation. On the same date, a letter informing the solicitors that the orders had been made and sent to the Garda issued. On 29 October 1998 the family was taken into custody. My Department has since been informed by the solicitor that the correspondence was not received by him until 30 October — ten days after it issued from my Department. The same means of communicating the decision to the applicants' legal representatives is used regularly and without difficulty.
As I have already indicated, I have requested a senior official of my Department to investigate all aspects of this and to report back to me. In the meantime, I have also asked the Garda to defer enforcement of the deportation order. That is where the matter stands at the moment and I will await the report of my senior official before taking any further action.
I should like to add one further detail which is relevant. On 30 October 1998 my Department received under cover of a letter from the family's legal adviser, not the same person who formerly represented it, a statement signed by the adult members of the family undertaking that they and their younger son would leave Ireland on 4 November 1998 and saying that they would be most appreciative if I would allow the older son to remain here to complete his leaving certificate and that he would be cared for by his uncle's family. I am prepared to consider this request.
Much has been made of the length of time the family has been in the State. The greater part of the delay which has occurred in this case resulted from the utter inadequacy of the system for processing asylum claims during the term of office of the previous Government. One of the delaying factors was the view held at the time when Deputy McManus's party and Deputy Higgins's party were in Government that the State should not pay for legal advice and representation for asylum seekers for their asylum appeals. When this Government took office in June 1997 there were just 22 staff to deal with the thousands of cases which had built up over the previous two years. Apparently a few months before that there were four staff assigned to this mammoth task. I was faced with a chaotic situation where nobody had exercised political leadership, let alone put in place administrative arrangements, and where applicants were left completely in the dark about whether their cases would be dealt with, if ever. The legacy of the previous Government in this area could only be described as a complete and utter shambles.
(Mayo): We did not deport people.
I find it hard to accept some of the comments made by Opposition politicians in this context. I doubt if any reasonable person could blame me for that.
This Government has increased the staffing in this area of the Department almost tenfold to close on 200. We now aim to deal with new arrivals as they come into the system and, if possible, to give decisions on their applications within six months. At the same time, we are making substantial inroads into the backlog of applications to such an extent that in a matter of weeks all applications lodged prior to 1997 will be at various stages of processing in the system. We have established a "one stop shop" customised premises which includes reception, social welfare and health facilities for asylum seekers, as well as the processing of claims.
Members opposite and others from time to time have called for full implementation of the Refugee Act. I have explained the position in that regard times out of number and I see no useful purpose in repeating myself. The rainbow coalition had ample opportunity to implement the Act in the latter part of 1996 and in the first six months of 1997 when it was in office, but it failed to do so. In the circumstances I wonder why it has become such a major priority for the parties that made up that Government since they departed office.
There is one important point I want to make in conclusion. When people fail in their application for asylum and cannot show good and sufficient reason why permission to remain in the State on other grounds should be granted, it follows logically that they must be asked to leave the State and be deported if necessary. This is essential to maintain the integrity of the asylum process and is a view strongly shared by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
The Dáil adjourned at 9.20 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Thursday, 5 November 1998.