Newly-arrived asylum-seekers are now obliged to live in State-provided full-board accommodation or else forgo their right to anything more than scant welfare supports.
In a significant departure from the previous social welfare regime, new refugee applicants are no longer entitled to claim rent supplement to allow them to live in private rented accommodation.
The measure means that asylum-seekers will be effectively tied to living in their State-provided full-board accommodation in large centres around the country if they are to receive State support.
Most asylum-seekers have been allocated accommodation in "direct provision" centres such as former hotels since the system was introduced in April.
However, community welfare officers have until now had the discretion to allow asylum-seekers who were pregnant or those with other special needs to quit direct provision accommodation and live in the private rental sector, claiming rent payments.
Since direct provision was introduced more than three years ago, some 10,000 people have left it and claimed ordinary welfare benefits, according to the Department of Justice.
These people had been able to claim standard welfare benefits on the same basis as citizens, including basic weekly Supplementary Welfare Allowance, currently set at €124.80, and Rent Supplement.
The new measures are aimed at ensuring that all asylum-seekers remain instead in the "direct provision" system, where they receive a reduced Supplementary Welfare Allowance of €19.10 per adult per week, as well as having food and laundry services provided.
A spokesman for the Department of Justice said new asylum-seekers who turn down their allocated direct provision accommodation will still be entitled only to the same reduced payments.
The new arrangements stem from the recently-passed Social Welfare (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, which states that asylum-seekers and illegal immigrants are no longer entitled to Rent Supplement.
A spokesman for the Department of Social and Family Affairs said it was now expected that newly-arrived asylum-seekers would be accommodated in the direct provision system, apart from "exceptional cases".
The department made payments totalling €111.5 million to asylum-seekers, refugees and people with leave to remain in the State last year, according to estimates released under the Freedom of Information Act.
Of this, €7.6 million was paid to people in direct provision, with €103.9 million paid to people not in direct provision. This spending accounted for about a fifth of the total of expenditure under the social welfare allowance scheme, and included almost €40 million in Rent Supplement payments.
About €75 million was spent last year on housing asylum-seekers in direct provision accommodation, according to the Department of Justice spokesman. Up to 5,500 people can be accommodated in such housing, but it is usually 80 to 85 per cent full.
The spokesman said it would be impossible to calculate the future savings the new arrangements will bring as this depended on the numbers of asylum claims made this year.
The Irish Refugee Council yesterday criticised the move as a "serious retrograde step" in asylum policy.