Minister Roderic O’Gorman has confirmed that the National Indoor Sports Arena at Abbotstown was selected to be used for emergency refugee accommodation – with Independent TD Carol Nolan querying if due consideration was given to the disruption that the decision would cause to clubs that use the facilities.
The Laois TD asked Minister O’Gorman how the decision regarding the use of Abbotstown as a refugee centre was made, and if Catherine Martin TD, the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media had been consulted.
It had been widely reported that Sports Ireland had “offered” the use of the indoor sports area for a period of six weeks as the government struggles to deal with a huge rise in those claiming to seek asylum in addition to Ukrainian refugees.
In reply, Minister O’Gorman said that almost 12,000 people claiming asylum had arrived in Ireland in the past 12 months – more than three times the average over the past 10 years. He said that this number, in addition to those from Ukraine, had led to ‘significant accommodation shortages’ and that a “total of 30 accommodation locations utilised since January 2022 across 13 counties.”
He said his department was working to “elicit offers of accommodation”, with a “call through the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media to sporting organisations to use their facilities”.
“The National Indoor Arena was offered as part of that process and has recently come into use for the International Protection Accommodation Service (IPAS) to provide emergency accommodation for a 6 week period. The Department is closely engaged with the provider and measures have been implemented in order to minimise disruption to users of the arena,” Minister O’Gorman said.
Minister for Sport, Catherine Martin TD, said that officials from the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth under Minister O’Gorman had “engaged directly with Sport Ireland regarding the use of the National Indoor Arena as emergency accommodation and, on Friday 2 September, Sport Ireland announced that it would be making the National Indoor Athletics Training Centre in the Sport Ireland National Indoor Arena available for a period of up to six weeks to assist in this humanitarian effort.”
“The oblique nature of these answers tries to mask the reality that it is the relevant Ministers who decide to request that sports facilities that are crucial to the wellbeing of our young people in particular be used for emergency accommodation. The replies also mask the fact that the huge jump in non-Ukrainian refugees was directly driven by the polices of Minister O’Gorman and the government,” said Carol Nolan TD.
“These policies have substantially increased the ‘pull factor’ for migrants of all kinds, with Government virtually guaranteeing housing and other benefits to all those who can physically reach Ireland to claim asylum; a guarantee they have failed to make to our own people who continue to languish on housing lists or who are forced out of the affordable housing market.”