The Government decision on refugee visas shows just how tight things are getting

The drumbeat that signalled refugee trouble escalated through last week, culminating in the decision to put people on the floor of the old terminal building in Dublin Airport. The days before had seen meetings of the Senior Officials Group, a high-powered group of civil servants charged with monitoring the crisis, and the Cabinet subcommittee on Ukraine, composed of senior Ministers in charge of the response. “Frankly, we weren’t sure if there would be enough space in the airport,” says one person involved in the planning last week. Looking for a silver lining, the person add: “We haven’t been left with people roaming the streets, which potentially could have happened.”

The decision to suspend visa-free travel for refugees into the State cannot be separated from the crisis point that emerged last week. There are undoubtedly concerns about abuse and misuse of the system. However, the fact that the Government feels compelled to step out from an international agreement that has only been deferred twice before in its 60-plus years of operation is indicative of the scale of the problem.

The gains would appear to be small: the step is designed to target those who have been approved for international protection (IP) elsewhere, and travel here under a visa exemption, only to apply again. Department of Justice figures suggest there may be only 479 such instances in the year to this January, or 7 per cent of all applications.

Detailed data on how that figure has changed in recent years has not been published, and the department had not responded to a request for it before publication due to an technical issue. But Government sources argue a massive upswing in the numbers seeking protection, coupled with the more than 40,000 arrivals from Ukraine – Ministers have been told not to expect any let-up – make such marginal differences important. “When we’ve reached the point where people are sleeping on floors in airports, 7 per cent matters,” says a source.

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The cocktail of post-pandemic pressures and the war in Ukraine is pushing many different facets of society into crisis mode; housing, inflation and the wider economy are being battered. This is true too for migration policy, where officials are seeking levers to pull. The system has moved to a permanent crisis footing, Government sources confide. “You’re shovelling out the water as quickly as it comes in.”

The refugee visa decision, they believe, should preserve the system for those fleeing war, likely at the expense of those who have been granted refugee status elsewhere already.

It is also inescapable that it will send a signal – indeed, that is a large part of the intent behind the move. Officials are also planning to reverse steps taken during the pandemic to put some of the more blunt measures in cold storage: to recommence issuing negative decisions on applications, and recommence deportation orders, likely in the autumn.

The step might slice 7 per cent, give or take, off IP applicant numbers, but one source confides that there is an obvious “secondary purpose which is about some level of sending a message”. The view in the department is that having disabled mechanisms that act as a layer of discouragement, they now have to be brought back on stream.

Internal figures suggest there are subtle shifts in the patterns of migration. For example, some 60 per cent of people seeking international protection are now applying in person at Mount Street in Dublin, rather than at Dublin Airport. This is a reversal of long-standing trends, and suggests people may be coming across the Border with Northern Ireland, or, indeed, arriving with documents that allow them through the airport – applying later for protection. Six countries account for 60 per cent of applications – Georgia being the largest, followed by Somalia, Algeria (a relatively recent arrival to the list) Zimbabwe and Nigeria.

The crisis is laying waste to plans and policies – as crises tend to do. In just one example, the group overseeing the Catherine Day White Paper on dismantling direct provision has been told to expect an associated impact from the migration crisis on its targets and timelines.

The Government decision shows just how tight things are getting: how the system will bear up under such pressures over the winter will have major ramifications.