Deputy Kelly can work away and speak now.

Sentiment score: 0.00

I have said before that rushed legislation makes for poor legislation. I was on the justice committee when it was agreed unanimously right across the committee that we would give as much time as possible to debate the EU asylum and migration pact and the legislation we are talking about today. It was agreed on a cross-party basis by members of the Minister's party, of his colleague's party and all the Government parties - that we would have a robust debate in the committee rather than coming in here and speaking for an eight-hour debate today and probably next week as well until the guillotine comes, which I expect it will at some stage. As my colleague said, it is absolutely bonkers that we received the amendments as late as we did and that we had to put amendments in before Second Stage was even completed. It is the wrong way of doing things. As Opposition, it does not give us time to research it. We do not have the same capacity that Government Ministers have with their teams of staff. I see officials beside the Minister. We do not have that facility. We have to research and look at all that information ourselves. We do not have reams and reams of staff to do this. The common-sense amendment that has been disallowed merely asked the Minister to do something simple to prepare for the enactment of this legislation. As we have heard before, fail to prepare and prepare to fail. We heard yesterday at a committee meeting that civil legal aid services are bursting at the seams already. They have not had any increases in fees since 2008. They simply will not be able to deal with any extra pressure that is going to be put on them as a result of this Bill. There is nothing here to deal with the vacancies in international protection. We are looking for the Minister to be able to prepare for that. That is all we were asking for in the amendment that has been ruled out of order. We do not know whether the provision of accommodation will be adequate. That needs to be prepared for. In my area of South Dublin County Council, we have the highest number of people staying in international protection in the whole State. There are 4,200 people there at the moment and it is bursting at the seams. It seems that because the Government is adopting the EU asylum and migration pact, this rush is about being the best boys in Europe and going straight into Europe and saying "yes, we will do what we are told". We will doff the cap and get on with it. That is no way to do it. We are a sovereign State and we should be able to look after our own rules and regulations when it comes to situations like this.

Sentiment score: 0.04

Listening to the debate, there seems to be one rule for the Government and another rule for the Opposition, with the Minister pushing his own legislation and not giving the Opposition the chance to undertake the proper scrutiny it needs to. I will give an example of why I am saying this, and the Minister will know where I am coming from. Last month, the Government delayed legislation I had before the House on nitrous oxide. I know it is not related to this issue, but the context is similar. The Minister decided to delay that legislation by nine months. The reason he gave me at the time was that he had just got sight of it and had not had a proper chance to go through it. That was the reason he gave me. As the Minister said, today we are discussing one of the most comprehensive Bills to come before this House and we are rushing through it. We have not had the chance to scrutinise this Bill in the way we should. We have only just got sight of some of the 267 amendments. I would like a copy of one of the green booklets but there are none to be found. I have a staff member looking for a copy of the amendment booklet so that I can look at the amendments while I am debating them rather than going on my phone, but the booklets are not even available. That is not good enough, but that is what happens when you rush legislation.

Sentiment score: -0.05

I will speak first about amendment No. 2. This amendment simply reaffirms that decisions on immigration and international protection remain the sole responsibility of the State. I have said before that Ireland is an independent sovereign state and should not be beholden to Europe on matters we can resolve ourselves. It has been the attitude of successive governments that we want to be the best in class when it comes to the EU. Ireland's position is unique and it has its own particular challenges. We are in the EU but are not in the Schengen area. We are part of a common travel area with a state that is outside the European Union. That is why the one-size-fits-all approach to migration and asylum is not in our best interests. There are many problems with the international protection system, which have been outlined already. Decisions are taking way too long. Appeals are taking too long. Deportation orders are not being enforced. There is massive profiteering from the provision of inappropriate IPAS accommodation. Fixing these problems does not require us to sign up to the EU migration and asylum pact. Ireland is a small, neutral country with an independent foreign policy. We should not allow the EU to dictate from which conflicts we should take people who are seeking refuge. This should be a matter for the Irish Government to decide. Amendment No. 2 is a safeguard to ensure the laws are made by Ireland's elected representatives and not handed over to Europe. Amendment No. 3 relates to the fact most international protection applicants arrive through the common travel area and yet there has been zero assessment of how the common travel area will be affected and no attempt to agree a bilateral arrangement with Britain. With the failure to prioritise this bilateral agreement on returns, the Government has left the State in an unacceptable situation in the management of migration. It is also time for the Government, including the Taoiseach, who appears to have a particular reluctance in this regard, to admit that, as with many other challenges faced in Ireland, having two states on this island impedes our ability to deal with migration properly. Brexit added another layer of complexity to the situation. It goes without saying that the management of migration will be simplified when there is one state on the island of Ireland. For this reason, and many others, it is time to start making unity a reality. I have raised this issue on numerous occasions. I have raised the need for a secure bilateral agreement with Britain to ensure that those international protection applicants who should be processed in Britain can be returned there promptly.

Sentiment score: -0.01

Give it a go.

Sentiment score: 0.00

This amendment seeks to provide a clear definition of "legal counselling". We were asked many questions about legal counselling during the justice committee's hearings on this legislation, such as how it is to be defined, what it means and who will provide it. There will be a lack of clarity if legal counsel is provided by non-legal professionals. Is it to be individual counselling? Is it to be group counselling? Is group counselling even ethical under professional rules? Before I was elected here in 2019, I worked as an addiction counsellor. I could call myself a behavioural therapist. There were no regulations in relation to that under CORU at the time. Since I became a Member, the regulation and registration of counselling by CORU still has not happened. Will the term "legal counselling" have to be regulated by CORU? As I mentioned, counsellors and psychotherapists are still not regulated. This process began in 2018. It was in the programme for Government in 2020. It still has not happened. For this new term, "legal counsellors", will CORU also be required to regulate this or is it something that may happen down the line when all of a sudden we realise that there are unintended consequences of this new term and that this new form of counselling will have to be regulated by an outside branch?

Sentiment score: 0.11

The Minister has said he will bring forward a definition of "legal counselling". This doubles down on the point we were making earlier that this is rushed legislation. We are on Committee Stage and we still do not have a definition in front of us to be able to discuss what "legal counselling" is. Its absence is why these amendments are being put forward today. We would not have to discuss these amendments if there was a clear definition of "legal counselling". I will return to the questions I asked the first time I came in. Could the Minister provide clarification in respect of his definition of "legal counselling", when it comes forward? Who is going to provide it? Who is going to regulate it? Is it going to be individual counselling or will it be group counselling? I know that was brought up at the justice committee. There were concerns around whether it was going to be group counselling. If so, you could have different people from different backgrounds getting information in different languages, which could be very confusing for them. Who will provide it? Who will regulate it? Will it be individual counselling or group counselling?

Sentiment score: 0.10

I reiterate what my colleagues have said about the meeting we had yesterday at the justice committee. The Minister does not have to believe us when we say there is a crisis in legal aid. The Bar Council of Ireland, the Law Society, FLAC, the Legal Aid Board and Women's Aid were all unanimously in agreement with that. They said the system is ready to collapse and is deteriorating in front of their eyes. Legal aid is fundamental to access to justice, especially in relation to domestic violence and family law. It is bursting at the seams, even without the added pressure this legislation looks like it will put on the Legal Aid Board. The Minister mentioned giving autonomy to the board and deciding on how it spends its resources. It is like Hobson's choice. Will it have to decide whether to help people in international protection, to help people with domestic violence or to help people in family law? Everybody that was at the meeting yesterday wants to do the right thing. I asked earlier about legal group counselling. This was done for children with additional needs. They did group therapy. It was a way of bringing down the list by having a number of people in a room at the same time for a box-ticking exercise. They got some therapy but it was all in a group setting. Will the Minister give me clarification? He has not answered that the couple of times I have asked. Will legal counselling be done in a group setting or an individual setting?

Sentiment score: 0.13

We are talking about definitions of "last resort" for people going into custody but we would not need to be talking about detentions if we had a rules-based system that worked and would enable people to be processed quickly and fairly. I have some questions about the detention of children in particular. Where are these children going to be held? Will this fall under Tusla or what body is going to be responsible? How many unaccompanied minors have arrived over the past couple of years? I have not been able to get those figures and I would appreciate it if the Minister could answer.

Sentiment score: 0.06

The Minister of State and I do not share a constituency but we do share the local authority area of South Dublin County Council. It houses the largest number of international protection applicants in the country with 4,200 in total. I have to say that some have settled in better than others but one thing they all have in common is that they are all with private operators who are making vast money from vulnerable people. An issue I have had from the start is with communication and consultation, how it is delivered and how people find out. It needs to be better because when it is not communicated well to people in our constituencies, it leaves a space for misinformation, bad actors and rumours. I will give an example. Any time there was a bit of work being done on a building, people said it would be the next IPAS centre. I will never forget that I had to stand outside the old Rowlagh credit union in Neilstown when it was getting done up. Nobody knew what was going on at the time or why it was being done up. Rumours were started and spray paint was being put all over the building to burn it out. There was all this kind of stuff that is not wanted in our communities. It is not with regard to my community but this is what was happening. It took me to find out what was happening. A much-needed GP service was coming into an area of high disadvantage. I had to go and speak to the doctor. He was from Kerry and was relocating his service into north Clondalkin. I had to stand outside and take a photograph and explain to people what was happening. My concern was that bad actors were going to come in and burn the place down. This was the direct impact of no communication and no consultation on the locations of IPAS centres. Citywest is also in our area. Communities and TDs should not have had to find out from national newspapers that the Government was going to purchase Citywest as a public IPAS centre. This is no way to do business. It caused a lot of hurt and anger in the area. Citywest will not be the last public IPAS centre that the Government will put in place but it has to learn from the mistakes that have been made already. The community engagement team came in after the fact and not during the fact. I have to be honest and say it has got better. The responses I am getting from the community engagement team are a lot better. I always say, and I have said it to the Minister before publicly and privately, that we need people on the community engagement team who have the ability to make decisions. Instead of going off and finding out information and coming back again, they should have the ability to make real decisions that will make a difference in our communities. The amendment we are speaking about is on a community impact assessment. It is about seeing what impact an international protection service would have, and what impact having more vulnerable people in it would have on the area. If we had a community impact assessment prior to Citywest, for example, we would have known there were issues in the area with a lack of gardaí, a lack of school places, transport and GP provision. There is no provision for public health nurses in the area. All of these issues could have been ironed out before the announcement was made and it would have stopped an awful lot of upset in the community. The Pobal deprivation index has to be key if other centres are going in. We must make sure we use the Pobal deprivation index. I spoke to the Minister not long ago. Parts of my constituency have gone backwards in the Pobal deprivation index. They went from being areas of high disadvantage to being areas of extremely disadvantaged in recent years. If consideration was being given to putting an international protection centre in these places on top of everything else I do not think it would be the right thing to do. The Pobal deprivation index should be considered by the Government. This is a very sensible amendment. It calls for an assessment of an area before something else goes into it. I would like the Minister to take the amendment on board.

Sentiment score: -0.09