Sir, - I wonder has Jim O'Higgins TD any idea of what he is talking about when he proposes "a Morrison visa-type amnesty" for illegal immigrants? The Morrison programme did not incorporate an amnesty for Irish illegals in America. The programme provided a visa quota, requiring individual application, for all Irish nationals; it was not confined to those resident illegally in America at the time, nor was there any bias in their favour in the programme. The visas were awarded by lottery and were subject to the normal regulations governing the assessment of eligibility and suitability.
The Morrison visa programme provides no precedent for an amnesty for illegal immigrants in Ireland as the circumstances are completely different. If Mr O'Higgins wants a new immigration policy, targeted by nationality or completely open, perhaps he would let us have precise proposals rather than attempting to suggest that his proposed amnesty is no more than was done for the Irish illegals in America.
The arguments hitherto have been about process, but now that the process has begun to work the debate has shifted to amnesty. There seems to be a studied unwillingness to see existing immigration law applied or to propose specific changes to it. The trouble about any new general policy on immigration is that it would raise all those awkward questions about criteria and numbers. And it might well reveal that many of those already here illegally would not be the most deserving under the new criteria.
Amnesties - i.e. relief from consequences legally due - are a bad idea as a rule and require formidable justification. The only reason that I see given is to tidy up, put the past behind us and start all over again. That, it seems to me, is an evasion of the policy issue, -Yours, etc.,
John O'Callaghan,
Lakelands Avenue, Kilmacud, Co Dublin.