Independent TD, Marc MacSharry, has told the Dáil debate on the EU Migration Pact that he believes, because Ireland has the lowest population density in Europe, the EU could determine that this country “is in a position to take in more of the 2.5 billion people who wish to migrate north”.
The Sligo deputy made his remarks in the context of the Dáil debate on the controversial EU Migration Pact, which saw the final vote postponed until next week.
“Whenever the vote is, I will be back to vote against the pact or our opting in at this time. As other Members have said, we are putting the cart before the horse,” Deputy MacSharry said.
“Some of us are old enough to remember the Amsterdam treaty in 1998, which we voted for, and our two outings on Lisbon in 2008 and 2009. It is worth noting that we looked for certain things in that and we have to ask ourselves what has changed since then to want us to decide now, without consulting the people directly, to unilaterally remove the safeguards we sought to opt out. That is a problem for me.,” he said.
“It would be worthwhile if some of us examined the reasons we needed and sought those opt-outs at that time,” he continued. He said the Government wanted the country to “opt in to the migration pact when we evidently and demonstrably have no plan such that, as Deputy Harkin has rightly pointed out, we want to legislate after the fact when it will be a fait accompli: this is what we must do; we have opted in.”
“Is there a removal of parts of our sovereignty sought very specifically in the Treaty of Amsterdam and the Treaty of Lisbon? The answer to that question is “Yes”. Again, as Deputy Harkin rightly pointed out, it will be decided by others under qualified majority voting just how many European colleagues feel Ireland is capable of taking in the future.”
“We have the lowest population per square km in Europe. It is 71. In Belgium it is 279, in Spain it is 94 and in Denmark it is 137,” he said. “I wonder where the EU will feel capacity exists.”
“It will be a fait accompli for whatever eight-year-old today is sitting at Cabinet when it is determined in Brussels that, given our low population density, Ireland is in a position to take in more of the 2.5 billion people who wish to migrate north,” he said.
“I am not anti-migration,” the Sligo TD added, saying he was in the Dáil “to point t out what I have been saying for the past two and a half years.”
“The other side of the House has no strategic approach to migration. We have taken a headless chicken approach. We decided to take over our tourism businesses to house people from Ukraine while incentivising them to come here,” he claimed.
“The Minister says there is a plan when we have hundreds of people living beside the canals. It is an insult to the people of Ireland that the Government is dressing it up in such a way that any dissenting voice is the loony hard right,” he added.
The government Chief Whip, Hildegarde Naughton, said that “given the interest expressed in the debate on the motion on international protection, asylum and migration”, the vote would be extended it into next week.
In response, Tipperary TD, Mattie McGrath said that the proposal to defer was a “trick of the loop”, saying he believed “the Government might be short of numbers tonight and it is afraid to hold a vote.”
When An Ceann Comhairle, Seán Ó Fearghail said “People wanted more time and they are getting more time”, Deputy McGrath replied: “Of course I want more time because it is a very serious issue. I want a referendum but it is being played around with. It was buried for three weeks during the elections to get the next one over and fool the people and now the Government is trying to fool all of us here too.”
Earlier, the Minister for Social Protection, Heather Humphreys, said that she was “pleased to give my support to Ireland opting into the EU migration and asylum pact.”
“We can all agree on the immense value that people coming here to work, live or study bring to Ireland economically, socially and culturally. The importance of the international protection process for those fleeing persecution and Ireland’s duty to provide shelter for those most vulnerable also need to be recognised,” she said.