Asylum seekers based at the former holiday centre in Mosney, Co. Meath this week began a protest at a plan by the Government to move some of them to asylum centres in Dublin. The Department of Justice insists that due to the falling numbers of those seeking asylum in Ireland, vacancies have become available in Dublin that they need to fill as part of a value-for-money review of the €90m the Exchequer spends on the asylum process annually.
Department officials argue that they are only planning on moving single people, the apparent logic being that single people have less familial ties. This, of course, ignores the fact that it is not just families who build an attachment to a place and a community. Many of the single asylum seekers, who endured persecution and an arduous fear-filled journey to safety in Ireland, have found comfort and solace in the community atmosphere that has been created in Mosney since it became a home to hundreds of asylum seekers almost 10 years ago. Many of these same asylum seekers who have tragically and often reluctantly had to flee the land of their birth have formed a tight-knit inter-dependant community in Mosney. While some have had their cases heard and either been deported or settled elsewhere in Ireland, many have lived together as neighbours for up to five years awaiting word of their fate.
The Government's apparent contention that moving around asylum seekers who are single is inconsequential ignores the fact that they too are part of the wider family and wider community that have a shared history and a shared experience in Mosney. They are not just individuals; they are members of a community.
The fact that so many asylum seekers, who are rightly protected and guaranteed safety in free countries like Ireland by international law, have spent up to five years waiting for their cases to be processed is a disgrace. It is not reasonable to expect that it should routinely take authorities years to assess whether or not an individual or a family is entitled to asylum. Any person who has come to Ireland motivated by a well-founded fear of being persecuted in their home country deserves our care and welfare. Their cases ought to be heard quickly and their process of being integrated as full members of Irish society expedited.
There will, of course, be those who will falsely claim asylum. These people too have a right to be treated in a just fashion, have their cases adjudicated on as quickly as possible, and, when deemed unsuccessful, returned to their country of origin quickly.
Quite apart from the heart-wrenching pain that must be caused by the waiting-game that has become our asylum process, asylum seekers are denied the right to work in Ireland while awaiting news of their fate. This not only deprives the asylum seekers of valuable income and meaningful engagement, it also deprives them of the dignity of work and the esteem of making a contribution to their host country.
We need a more just asylum system, a system that is not only just in its outcome, but is also just in its process. That means speeding-up the processing of asylum applications and of creating an imaginative way of allowing asylum seekers to engage in meaningful work.
