International Protection

Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 10 November 2020

Tuesday, 10 November 2020

Ceisteanna (585)

Pa Daly

Ceist:

585. Deputy Pa Daly asked the Minister for Justice the monthly number of refusals for permission to remain by total figures; and the number of years each applicant who was refused has been within the international protection system. [34531/20]

Freagraí scríofa

Minister for Justice

My Department looks at all international protection applications made in the State on a case by case basis in accordance with the legislation, the International Protection Act 2015. If an applicant fails in their International Protection claim, they may seek humanitarian leave to remain. Each consideration takes into account a number of factors as set out in section 49 of the Act.

Since the International Protection Act 2015 commenced on 31 December 2016, the International Protection Office has carried out the function of considering Permission to Remain (under section 49 of the 2015 Act), in respect of those applicants who have been refused international protection at first instance.

The statistics below are correct as of 6 November 2020, but may be subject to data cleansing.

Table 1

Refusal of Permission to Remain	Year Decision
Month Decision	2017	2018	2019	2020 to end September	Grand Total
Jan		117	109	229
Feb		130	21	242
Mar		144	164	147
Apr	2	170	194
May	46	216	218
Jun	60	154	201	18
Jul	95	137	225	204
Aug	120	147	175	189
Sep	143	132	198	144
Oct	135	161	199
Nov	146	190	231
Dec	84	129	147
Grand Total	831	1827	2082	1173	5913

Table 2 below sets out by date the number of persons refused permission to remain following a review of a negative permission to remain decision. It should be noted that there were no permission to remain reviews completed during 2017.

Table 2 *

	Year Decision
Month Decision	2018	2019	2020 to end September	Grand Total
Jan		7	86
Feb		65	55
Mar		2	37
Apr	4	16
May	38	8
Jun	16	75
Jul	26	55
Aug	50	97
Sep	15	44	37
Oct	53	61
Nov	37	43
Dec	59	60
Grand Total	298	533	215	1046

* Persons in this table are included in table 1 .

Table 3 below shows the number of years each applicant has been within the international protection system. These figures include decisions made under Table 2 (PTR Review decisions).

Table 3
Number of years from date of application to date of permission to remain refusal	No. of applicants
0	1395
1	2510
2	1788
3	744
4	391
5	106
6	7
7	4
8	6
9	3
10	4
12	1
Grand Total	6959

As can be seen from the figures in Table 3, over 92% of all refusals to remain (including reviews of earlier refusal decisions) are considered within 3 years of the date of application. The length of time stated in the table is not the time taken from application to the issuing of a first instance decision rather the total time an application is in the process. This can include time in respect of an appeal, where an applicant has appealed a first instance recommendation in respect of their international protection application and where an applicant may also have challenged a decision by way of Judicial Review, which can significantly increase the processing times to final decision stage of an application.