Night after night on our television screens we see the plight of wretched people running from their respective wartorn countries, but I am absolutely shocked at the level of racist comment that I am beginning to hear around the country. Yesterday a man stood outside the gates of Leinster House with a sign saying "No more refugees." Many of us will have visited New York at some stage in our lives and seen Ellis Island. I wonder how we would have felt back in the 1800s if there was somebody standing on Ellis Island with a sign saying "Go away."

They did; they treated Irish people desperately.

The Irish populated countries as far away as Australia, Canada and the United States of America. One will find Irish people and Irish pubs all over the world. People are not coming to this country because they want to do so. They are coming because they have nowhere else to go. It poses huge problems for us, but I am happy to congratulate the Irish Congress of Trade Unions for offering its training centres throughout the country to provide training, socialisation and language programmes for refugees coming to this country. We should acknowledge that offer.

One of the most serious issues for those coming here concerns the fact that they have left their own countries with nothing. They left without paperwork and so forth, so there will have to be fairly stringent recognition of prior learning. If somebody comes into the country and presents as a doctor or engineer, how do we verify this? I recall many years ago a butcher operating as an orthopaedic surgeon for a number of years in one of the main hospitals. That is an issue that must be borne in mind.

On the issue of planning, we have a construction industry that is on its knees, although it is now beginning to recover. I acknowledge the work of the Government in reviving the economy, but the planning system needs examination. I am calling for a debate on planning, particularly with regard to the notion of planning for local needs only. There are people with money who are prepared to build houses in rural parts of Ireland, but they are being blocked purely on the basis of the local need condition. One must question where we are going with planning in that regard. I ask for a debate on the issue in order to try to lay down some ground rules for what constitutes local need because it appears that it differs from one place to another. I ask the Leader to consider organising such a debate.