Asylum arrivals and abuse
Deputy Shanahan asked about people arriving at Dublin Airport without documents and seeking refugee status after leaving other EU jurisdictions. The Taoiseach said abuse of the system had already been identified and some rules were changed, and that vigilance remained necessary.
The Taoiseach knows I am someone who has engaged with the Minister and Department with responsibility for children on trying to secure accommodation in Waterford and the south east for Ukrainian refugees. My question relates to abuses occurring in our immigration system. Recently I wrote to the Minister for Justice regarding the status of people leaving other European jurisdictions on travel documents and arriving at Dublin Airport with no travel documents looking for refugee status. The Minister responded that in the first nine months of this year 3,705 people arrived at Dublin Airport undocumented and that of a total of 5,662 persons presenting who were refused leave 4,969 persons indicated an intention to claim asylum. The Minister stated it is clear that a significant number hold status in another member state and are likely to have travelled here on conventional travel documents. We need to do more to shore up our borders and immigration policy.
Comment on this
There are issues which the Deputy has highlighted. We have already taken some action on people coming from some EU countries with documents that were dispensed with when they arrived here and then they applied for asylum. This is particularly with regard to European refugees. We disapplied some aspects of the European Convention in this regard because an abuse was identified and highlighted. We have to be vigilant that there is not this level of abuse of existing systems.