I call Deputy Boyd Barrett.

It will be Deputy Smith.

I am the leader for the new year, okay?

Congratulations.

I want to put it up to the Minister and to the entire Government that the problems we have seen over the past few days in Roscrea and beyond are not the fault of asylum seekers; they are the Government's fault. I am pointing the figure at the Government because I really mean this. I am so angry, as is everybody, about the scenes of women and their children being frightened and bullied, and harangued and harassed, as well as the scenes of violence that ensued from that and them having to witness it.

It is happening, not because they are a problem but because the Government is a problem and previous Governments were a problem precisely because the Government's housing policy and its lack of delivery on public services has led to the anger of ordinary people whipped up by the lies and viciousness of the far right; the Nazi supporters who want to blame refugees and people of colour. They have directed that against asylum seekers instead of directing it against the Government and its policies.

The reason I am doing this in such a vociferous way is that we have echoes of those Nazi supporters' lies in this Chamber. Those echoes, which come from Rural Independent Members and others across this House, which blame refugees for the problems that we have, actually make a difference to how people think. When people find that this is going on, and is echoed by Deputies and others in this House, and now councillors - from Mayo right down to Kerry, they are talking about not dealing with or talking to the Government about refugees - and they are in the Government parties, the Government should rein them in and not allow this happen. The Government should rein in its councillors and not allow them to pass motions that refuse to deal with the Department on the question of refugees. The sooner they get out of government, the better because, until and unless they do, we will have the complication of people blaming refugees instead of blaming the Government.

However, I want to put it up to other Deputies, such as Deputy Lowry, who boasts regularly about what he has achieved for north Tipperary. Why does the Deputy continually vote confidence in the Government and vote against a ban on evictions? By doing that, the Deputy is supporting those who are implementing the policies where migrants and asylum seekers are being scapegoated. It might sound like a bit of leap, but every time one refuses to deal with the housing crisis with a lack of public services, it adds fuel to the fire.

I do not care how many nice liberal Fine Gaelers get on "The Tonight Show" and sound tough and hard on it; the reality is that it is the Government's policies that are implementing the scapegoating of migrants. Deputies should not talk about us suffering from an invasion. The invasion we are suffering from is when Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael opened up this country to vulture and real estate investment funds, which are buying up housing estates still, 85% of them, and are depriving ordinary teachers, nurses, doctors and people who provide services of the ability to put down roots in this country. All of that feeds into this migrant crisis and until we get rid of those policies, that is, of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and its mudguards in the Greens, we are not going to make the difference.

The Deputy has just given the far right a pass. It is a disgrace.

I am all in favour of robust debate but it is not fair, by any stretch of the imagination, to equate any Member of this House, in any way, with Nazism.

Thank you.

Not by any stretch of the imagination. The Deputy diminishes the appalling nature of what Nazism is to do so.

I will have that debate with the Ceann Comhairle again but I stand over my right to say that they echo the sympathies of Nazis.

The Deputy can say what she likes.

I can.

I am simply pointing out the facts.

They are not facts.

They are not the facts.

Deputy Mattie McGrath over there-----

The Deputy is going down a dangerous road. The rise of far right ideology and anti-immigration sentiment in Ireland is worrying. It is something we have seen in other countries for many years but it had not been an issue here. Unfortunately, that has changed but when you look ahead to 2024 the world is becoming a scary place. When we look at what is going on in Gaza, at Putin's war in Ukraine and the election in America, which looks like it will be divisive, we should not be fanning the flames on all of this propaganda, misinformation and outright lies being spread on social media. I accept that the Government needs to communicate better but the Deputy knows as well as I do that cutting through the lies on social media is not easy. There is an onus on every one of us in this House to show leadership. There is a lot of misinformation out there about immigration and as a Government we need to communicate better, as I said earlier. It is incumbent on every one of us to do that.

Migration has been good for Ireland and I will give some information to the House in that regard. The social insurance contributions from foreign nationals, that is, the PRSI contributions, amount to €3 billion per annum. Over the past ten years, it has amounted to €17 billion. That is coming from the workers in our health service, hospitality sector, food processing plants and other key sectors. That is helping us to pay for the pensioners in this country and for unemployment benefits. It is a wonder how some people can be at protests in the middle of the day when everyone else is working. We have had to announce more work permits recently because we cannot get staff in certain sectors.

The Government is dealing with an emergency situation. Over 107,000 Ukrainians have come here and there is a growth in the number of people applying for international protection. The Ukrainian war is going on much longer than anticipated, unfortunately, and people are staying longer. We are transferring from an emergency situation to a plan that allows us to accommodate the people coming here and to comply with our international obligations. We have a rules-based system and some 800 people were deported last year. We have doubled the number of staff in the Department of Justice in order that we can get decisions on international protection applications more quickly.

The challenges we are responding to are happening across Europe. It is something the Government is committed to dealing with. We have dealt with other challenges and people on the Opposition benches said at the time that we were doing the wrong thing. However, it turned out we were doing the right thing. There are challenges and we are dealing with them. I know the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, is working extremely hard in his Department.

To repeat, I am actually standing here to say the far right are liars and Nazi sympathisers. They spread bile and lies, first of all about single men, and then it extends to all refugees, including the terrified women and children we saw in the videos the other day. It is the far right that are spreading the riots. They are Nazi sympathisers and they see racism as a tool to deflect from what is going on in society. Unfortunately, however, it is deflecting against the Government and the problems it has created. The far right say Ireland is full but I will tell you what Ireland is full of: empty homes. There are 165,000 of them and the Government has never dealt with that. The homes have been lying empty for a long time under successive Governments of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, sometimes backed up by other parties that go into coalition with them. It is their policies that are creating the problem. If not, what the Government is saying to me is that ordinary people up and down the country who get sucked into this stuff are all baddies. I am not saying that; I am saying they are getting sucked in, instead of deflecting to the Government. The likes of Michael Lowry and Mattie McGrath, if they really cared about the people in north Tipperary, would be organising protests against the policies of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. They would not be voting against motions of no confidence; they would be voting to keep the eviction ban. They would, therefore, be providing services that would keep our nurses, doctors, vets, dentists and all the young people we educate in the country and deal with the lack of services in Roscrea and elsewhere.

The Deputy cannot blame the Government for people carrying out violent actions. She should not conflate the two issues of housing and immigration. Ukrainians and international protection applicants are being moved mainly into hotels and large-scale types of accommodation. They are not taking homes from Irish people. If that is the line the Deputy is trying to peddle, she is going down a very dangerous road.

We have taken a number of actions and will continue to work with communities and to improve our communication. The Minister, Deputy O’Gorman, is coming forward with a plan to provide more State accommodation for people who come into this country. That should be with us in the coming weeks. There are many things happening and we will continue to work on it. It is challenging. What is happening is happening right across Europe and we are not on our own here, but we want to deal with it in a way that is rules-based, shows respect and meets our international obligations to the people who come to our shores, many of whom come from very difficult circumstances.