O’Gorman hopes UK will engage with Dublin over changes to immigration policy

Minister for Integration Roderic O’Gorman said he hoped the UK government would engage with Dublin on any changes to immigration policy planned by the next UK prime minister.

Mr O’Gorman was responding to proposals by the two final candidates in the race to become the UK’s new prime minister to expand Britain’s controversial Rwanda immigration policy, which the Irish Government says has led to a recent surge in asylum applications in the Republic.

“We are conscious that there has been a change in UK immigration and migration policy over the last two or three years, not just specifically the Rwanda proposal, and this has had an impact on Ireland,” Mr O’Gorman said.

“So we would be very conscious of the changes that the UK would make and we would hope that the UK would engage with its closest neighbours in terms of the impact of the decisions they take.”

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Former UK chancellor Rishi Sunak said he would do “whatever it takes” to get the Tory government’s Rwanda plan “off the ground”, while British foreign secretary Liz Truss said she would extend the Rwanda scheme and increase immigration staff levels from 9,000 to 10,800, if elected Conservative leader and UK prime minister.

Britain’s deal with Rwanda involves asylum seekers deemed to have entered the UK illegally being sent to the east African country to have their asylum claims processed. The first flight under the scheme was due to leave in June but was stopped by the European Court of Human Rights.

A surge in the number of Ukrainians arriving into Ireland and an increase in international protection applicants, attributed to the UK’s Rwanda policy, pushed State accommodation to full capacity earlier this month and forced the Government to use the old terminal building at Dublin Airport as temporary accommodation for two nights.

Mr O’Gorman said his department had identified a specific location for a second welcome centre in addition to the Citywest conference in Dublin, which reached capacity two weeks ago.

“We have a preferred location but there’s still some contractual engagements going on there,” he said.

He said there were no current plans for more tented villages in addition to the tented accommodation erected last week at Gormanston Army camp in Co Meath and at the direct provision centre at Knockalisheen near Limerick city in Meelick, Co Clare.

No Ukrainian refugees are staying in Gormanston but some may arrive at the camp later this week, depending on arrival numbers and the availability of accommodation elsewhere, a spokeswoman for the Department of Children said.

Efforts are continuing to contract “all forms of accommodation” for Ukrainian arrivals, including the use of arenas and conference centres, the official said. She also confirmed that the Celbridge Manor Hotel in Co Kildare had been contracted to host new arrivals but refused to comment on the details of the contract. It is understood the former hotel, which has capacity for about 350 people, has been earmarked to host international protection applicants.

Of the more than 43,000 Ukrainians to arrive in Ireland since the start of the war, 32,140 have been referred to the Ukrainian crisis temporary accommodation team for housing support. In addition, there are a record number 13,684 asylum seekers staying in direct provision centres and emergency accommodation.

The Minister for Children was speaking after the opening of a photo exhibition at the Pavee Point Traveller and Roma Centre in Dublin, which documents the Nazi persecution and genocide of the German Sinti and Roma people between 1930 and 1945.

Mr O’Gorman said the Government would publish a new action plan against racism later this year, to include “measures to combat anti-Semitism, anti-gypsyism and other forms of racism”. It was also developing a new national Traveller and Roma inclusion strategy, he said.

Introducing the Minister, Gabi Muntean of Pavee Point’s Roma Programme said the Roma community was experiencing discrimination fleeing the war in Ukraine, struggling to get aid, transport and shelter on migration routes at border crossings into Europe.

Mr O’Gorman said the genocide, in which hundreds of thousands of Roma and Sinti people were killed, was “not spoken about to the extent that it needs to be spoken about”.

The Minister said it was important to “reflect on how we treat people today through the lens of how people were treated in our past”.

The exhibition coincides with Roma Genocide Remembrance Day on August 2nd.