It’s always a little surreal when the establishment and the media finally acknowledge the blindingly obvious: that Ireland’s reckless policies have acted as a pull factor in attracting migrants and asylum seekers here and have added significantly to the housing crisis and to the chaos in the health service.
In the past week, the media seamlessly moved from quoting NGOs and activists describing locals concerned about immigration as “far-right” and “racist”, to sharing an Taoiseach’s Leo Varadkar’s thoughts on Ireland being “at capacity” for refugees.
In the same way, RTÉ News was acknowledging that the “system is under strain” and that “officials have concluded that Ireland’s offering is significantly different to that of other countries”.
The RTÉ report then went on to explain that Ireland pays one of the highest rates of social welfare to Ukrainian refugees, with Jobseekers Allowance of €220 per week available, something Gript had previously revealed, but was already surely known to TDs and Ministers.
Now, the Financial Times is writing that “officials”, likely those working in government departments advising Cabinet, are spelling out what was as plain as the nose on one’s face.
“Officials say non time-limited housing offered to Ukrainian refugees may be a pull factor. The Department of Justice estimates that one in three recent applicants for temporary protection arrives in Ireland after first seeking temporary protection elsewhere in the EU,” the paper said.
The FT is referring to the policy which caused so much heat at Cabinet recently, when Minister Roderic O’Gorman tried to shift the responsibility for accommodating Ukrainians to Fianna Fáil’s Darragh O’Brien, provoking strong opposition from the Soldiers of Destiny.
Of course, offering housing without a time-limit is a pull factor. Offering the highest social welfare rates in Europe is also a pull factor.
Pretending that Ireland isn’t full when our housing crisis is driving our own young people abroad and refusing to say there are limits to how many people we can take in is a pull factor.
NGOs being pumped full of taxpayers’ funds to shout down locals who are upset about not being consulted is a pull factor. Calling people racist for having concerns about immigration – even though that’s a huge majority of Irish voters – was a pull factor.
Insisting that the EU would not allow us to place limits on asylum seekers – even though the relevant EU Directive, as my colleague Matt Tracey, frequently pointed out specifically referred to capacity – was a pull factor.
If the world can see that Ireland’s political establishment was unwilling to put the needs of its citizens before a desire to be the best boys in the class for the EU, that is a pull factor
Roderic O’Gorman idiotically tweeting out in Albanian, Arabic, Somali, Urdu and Georgian that own-door accommodation within four months would be available to migrants claiming asylum, as well as medical cards, dentistry, mental health and other services – was a pull factor.
His promise that a plethora of taxpayer-funded NGOs would be there to assist with everything from getting a driver’s licence to a bank account to work permits, was a pull factor.
Darragh O’Brien trying to shout down Carol Nolan TD who raised perfectly reasonable questions about the huge rise of migrants and refugees arriving was part of the dishonest political culture which sought to stifle debate and was also part of the pull factor.
His bluster about the risk Deputy Nolan supposedly posed to “social cohesion” by asking questions has worn very thin indeed. Where no questions are permitted of the obviously flawed asylum system even when the numbers accommodated are going through the roof then the whole system and those who protect it from genuine and robust examination are part of the pull factor.
We’ve had nothing but pull factors – and now we have almost 25,000 people in asylum claimants accommodation, though the data suggests that most of them are economic migrants, and another 100,000 Ukrainians in the country under temporary protection, and a government suddenly acting as if they knew those terrible far-right talking points to be true from the beginning.
Writing on extra.ie, journalist John Lee, said that a Cabinet source had told him that Minister O’Gorman was ‘determined to transfer responsibility for housing refugees from his department’.
But they added: ‘The only problem is that he wants to transfer them into the abyss. Yes, he’s frustrated, but you can’t make half a proposal, where he says these people we’ve given refuge to now have to be moved. But we all know there is nowhere to move them.’
What’s really frustrating is that has taken an absolute crisis, and perhaps an impending election, for government figures to even acknowledge that Ireland does, in fact, have a capacity, and that the blindingly obvious pull factors are a problem.
The real question now is what exactly the government is going to do about it?
Speaking to the FT, the Irish Refugee Council, which has seen a considerable jump in funding since the migrant crisis began, insisted that “taking refugees has been our [Ireland’s] role in this conflict.”
Any changes to the rules “could certainly be perceived as a deterrent to try to dissuade people from coming to Ireland”, Nick Henderson said. “Ethically, that’s a problem.”
Who will the government listen to: its advisers, its voters, the creaking of the system coming apart at the seams – or the NGOs who have helped create the crisis? Time will tell.