Ní réiteach atá sa Bhille seo, ach géilleadh ar ár bhflaitheas. Trí glacadh go hiomlán le comhaontú imirce agus tearmainn an Aontais Eorpaigh, tá neamhaird déanta ag an Rialtas ar fhírinne an tsaoil sa Stát seo, is í sin ná nach bhfuil muid mar chuid den limistéar Schengen; tá Teorann againn leis an dTuaisceart; agus tá comhlimistéar taistil againn leis an mBreatain. Tá Sinn Féin soiléir gur chóir go ndéanfaí na cinntí faoin inimirce i mBaile Átha Cliath, seachas sa Bhruiséal. Ní féidir linn tacú le creatlach a chuirfidh srianta ar rialtais eile amach anseo agus a dhéanann neamhaird ar bhuairt a léirigh an coiste um dhlí agus ceart san Oireachtais d’aon ghuth. Tá spriocdhátaí daingne socraithe ag an Aontas Eorpach agus, gan a dhóthain foirne nó tacaíochtaí dlí againn lena gcur i bhfeidhm, táimid ag tarraingt fíneálacha gan stad orainn féin as na sáruithe a bheidh le teacht. Tacaíonn muid le comhoibriú praiticiúil, ar nós Eurodac don ghrinnfhiosrú, ach diúltaíonn muid roimh smacht a chaitheamh amú. Teastaíonn córas ó Éirinn atá cothrom agus éifeachtach, córas atá múnlaithe ag muintir na hÉireann go háirithe. This Bill is not about fixing a broken system. It is not about fixing what is broken in Ireland's international protection system. It is about locking the State into a framework that will shape migration and asylum policy for years to come with serious interventions and implications for sovereignty, capacity, fairness and public confidence. At its core, this legislation gives effect to the Government’s decision to opt into the EU migration and asylum pact. Sinn Féin has been clear and consistent. The vast majority of that pact is not in Ireland’s interests. Our position is straightforward. Decisions on migration and international protection should be made in Ireland by an Irish Government accountable to the Irish people and shaped by our own circumstances and responsibilities. What is most disappointing - and frankly most telling - is that this Government ignored a unanimous, cross-party recommendation of the Oireachtas Committee on Justice, Home Affairs and Migration. After detailed pre-legislative scrutiny, that committee explicitly recommended that the Government reconsider opting into the majority of the EU migration and asylum pact. It was unanimous, cross-party and clear but the Government brushed it aside. Why bother with scrutiny if Ministers have already decided the outcome? It is also disgraceful that the Minister is not allowing the proper scrutiny of this Bill where the justice committee was also very clear that it wanted to do scrutiny of this Bill on Committee Stage in the committee. The Government is now scheduling this Bill before the Dáil next week. Second Stage of this Bill is to conclude on Thursday afternoon but the amendments for Committee Stage have to put in by Thursday morning. It shows the Government for what it is. Ireland has a legal right under Protocol 21 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union to opt-in or opt-out of measures in the area of freedom, security and justice on a case-by-case basis. That flexibility was central to securing public consent for the Treaty of Lisbon. People voted on the understanding that Ireland would retain control over sensitive areas like migration, asylum and justice. This Government chose not to use that flexibility. Instead, it signed Ireland up wholesale to a pact that transfers decision-making power away from this State and into EU-level mechanisms even where those mechanisms are ill-suited to Ireland’s position. That is a political choice; it is the wrong choice. Ireland is not a typical EU member state. We are not part of Schengen. We share a common travel area with a state outside the European Union. We have a land border with a non-EU jurisdiction. Yet officials acknowledged at the committee that there was no meaningful consideration of the common travel area when opting into this pact, despite repeated Government claims that most applicants arrive via that route. That is extraordinary. By tying Ireland fully into the EU system, the Government reduces the flexibility of future Irish Governments to respond pragmatically, including bilaterally with Britain, to changing migration patterns. It ties the hands of the Irish State and it does so unnecessarily. Even setting sovereignty concerns aside, which we do not, there is a more immediate problem. The State is not ready for this. The justice committee heard directly that failure to meet pact obligations could expose Ireland to infringement proceedings and significant daily fines. Yet officials could not say how much the State may be liable for. For 15,000 applications, staffing projections rise to over 1,500 people. For 18,000 applications, it is nearly 1,800 people. In mid-2025, there were fewer than 1,000 staff across the relevant bodies with vacancy rates already above 10%. We already have excessive delays. Decisions are already taking far too long and appeals even longer still. Now the Government proposes rigid EU-mandated deadlines without the staffing, infrastructure, or legal supports required to ensure fairness. That is how a system collapses. That is how states end up with fines for failures that were entirely predictable. We do not need the EU pact to fix the issues in the Irish international protection system. There are glaring problems that the Minister has failed to address. He has been in the job now for over a year and despite the headlines, he has very little to show for it. Decisions are taking too long. The median processing time was 15 months in quarter 3 of last year. Appeals are taking longer still. The latest figure we have showed that processing times are over 16 months. That is the longest they have been in four years. We are going backwards not forwards. This means that it is now taking two and half years from beginning to end to process an application. Let me spell it out because it is an important point. We did not need to sign up to the EU pact to sort out the delays in processing applications. We do not need and did not need the pact to fix the delays in the appeals system. We definitely do not need the pact to stop the wild profiteering. Those failures fall at the Minister's feet and the feet of this Government. The committee also raised serious concerns about the impact of this legislation on Tusla and the civil legal aid system. Both are already stretched and at breaking point. Tusla is responsible for some of the most vulnerable children in the State, including unaccompanied minors. Children have gone missing from care. There are known risks of trafficking and exploitation. Yet this Bill piles new obligations onto Tusla without addressing those failures. The same applies to legal aid. Accelerated procedures mean nothing if people cannot access timely, effective legal advice. Speed without fairness is not efficiency. It is injustice. Let me be clear. Sinn Féin did not oppose everything in the EU pact. We supported the asylum and migration management regulation because it allows Ireland to return applicants to the member state where they should be properly processed. We supported Eurodac because we believe that access to fingerprint data assists with vetting, child protection, tackling trafficking and enforcing decisions. Those measures serve Ireland’s interests. What we opposed - and continue to oppose - are measures that undermine Irish sovereignty, impose rigid procedures and fail to account for Ireland's realities. Protocol 21 exists precisely so Ireland can make those distinctions. This Government chose not to. One of the clearest symptoms of failure in the current system is the way IPAS accommodation has been imposed on communities without planning, assessment or engagement. New centres should only be located in areas properly resourced to accommodate them, not in communities that are already struggling. Site selection needs to be based on a pre-assessment of community capacity, including access to GPs, school places, transport and existing levels of disadvantage. At the same time, we cannot ignore the scale of profiteering that has been allowed to exist under this Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Government. It is eye watering. An estimated €1.2 billion of taxpayers' money was spent on IPAS accommodation in 2025 alone. Bed-per-night rates are skyrocketing. They are up 68% in two years. A small number of private operators under this Government are making millions while communities are left in the dark and services are being overwhelmed. The Comptroller and Auditor General has been scathing in relation to this. The profiteering in this sector needs to come to an end and come to an end very quickly. Ireland needs a migration and international protection system. We need one that is fair, efficient, humane and, crucially, enforced. However, this Bill does not deliver that. Instead, it locks Ireland into a pact that undermines sovereignty, ignores our unique circumstances, overestimates State capacity and risks repeating the very failures that brought the system into crisis. Sinn Féin believes Ireland can do better by making decisions in this House, planning properly, supporting integration and enforcing rules fairly. For those reasons, we cannot support the Bill.

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