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THE STATE HAS paid hotels and guesthouses an average of over €460,000 per week to the end of September this year to house the soaring numbers of asylum seekers in emergency accommodation.
According to new figures provided by Minister for Justice Charlie Flanagan, the spend on emergency accommodation from January to the end of September totals €18 million – or an average of €462,046 per week.
Underlining the increasing use of emergency accommodation by the International Protection Accommodation Services (IPAS), just €945,370 was spent in the final quarter of last year.
In a written Dáil reply to Fianna Fáil’s Justice spokesperson Jim O’Callaghan, Flanagan stated that there are currently 1,453 applicants residing in 35 emergency accommodation locations around the country.
Flanagan said his department does not disclose the specific location of emergency accommodation centres in order to protect the identity of international protection applicants.
Flanagan told O’Callaghan: “Due to an unexpected rise in applications – up 53% in the first nine months of this year – the 38 existing accommodation centres, which offer accommodation, food, utilities and a suite of State services, have reached capacity.”
Currently, there are 6,094 people residing in 38 Direct Provision centres located across 18 counties, along with the further 1,453 applicants residing in emergency accommodation.
TheJournal.ie previously reported that providing emergency accommodation for asylum seekers costs nearly three times more than Direct Provision centres.
‘Inappropriate and wasteful’
Speaking today, O’Callaghan said asylum seekers “should not be exposed to long-term stays in emergency accommodation”.
“As well as being inappropriate, it is also a very wasteful use of limited State resources. The State should identify any State property that can be used for the purpose of providing accommodation for asylum seekers.”
At a Budget 2020 briefing last week, Minister of State for Equality, Immigration and Integration David Stanton said the cost of accommodating asylum seekers could be €60 million over-budget this year.
Stanton said the extra demand placed on the asylum system this year meant the State “could be looking at an extra €60 million, €50 to 60 million” depending on the rest of the year.
He said this money was on top of the €70 million allocated in Budget 2019 for this area.
In his written reply to O’Callaghan, Flanagan added that his department is “actively working on securing additional capacity, both in existing centres and through the sourcing of new centres”.
“Every effort is being made to re-accommodate applicants residing in emergency locations to a dedicated accommodation centre as quickly as possible,” he said.
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Shameful waste of tax payers money this government has to go
Deplorable. No wonder the country’s policies are backwards
@GooseSkipGoose: Asylum doesn’t work, you suppose to seek asylum in the first safe country you reach, However most transit through EU countries to get here.
@The long walk home☘️: Bertie Ahern brought that in in the Dublin Treaty, people didn’t realise then how things would work out. It’s definitely a no go under the current climate for the Country’s around the Mediterranean that’s why it’s happening.
country is a joke look after your own
@Mark Campbell: so we shouldn’t accept any asylum seekers? Any immigrants of any kind?
@GrahamMManning: and of course require our own to return from all over the world to settle back here in Ireland where we can take good care of them.
@Gavin Conran: perhaps even their descendants?
State needs to sort itself out, put more resources to dealing with these cases. Provide some timely interventions to either send these people home or to provide them with asylum here and help integrate them. Throwing money away in this, in a week, how much could be saved on dealing with cases! Or maybe I should buy a guest house and get pally with Chazza and his pals in the dept!
@ThatLJD: give em a pps number and a job let them live like everyone else and pay their way
@Eamonn Roche: Great but where will they live?
@Eamonn Roche: So do away with our visa system entirely and allow anyone who wants to come to Ireland to do so as long as they work? The only legal basis for asylum seekers to be in Ireland is for the determination of their claim for asylum. The top two claimants are two non-E.U. European states, Albania and Georgia. They have a 99% and 97% rejection rate respectively. The next two claimants are Zimbabwe and Nigeria with an 82% and 94% rejection rates. They should all be fast tracked.
The DP system is the best system to accommodate asylum seekers providing the initial claims are processed within a six to nine month time scale. It should be much faster than that for the top four claimant counties. The issues are decision times, asylum shopping and economic migrants making bogus claims.
So wrong in so many ways
Ya while our own are dying on the streets daily young homeless family’s kids aswell living in tents if there lucky while Leo & co give themselves a pay rise. charity stops at home im afraid this country is F#ked and no im not racist snowflakes !!
@United Ireland: ignoring the spelling and sentence structure. No our own aren’t “dying on the streets daily”, no one is lucky to live in a tent, if charity stopped at home no one would help the people you’re describing, in some areas fair nuff we are f’ed and if you have to deny being something guess what you might be?
@GrahamMManning: Im denying that Im blind, does that mean I might be blind? See how your argument about racism falls short? I never understood that logic. Denying doesnt equate to being.
@Dom: it means you might be. Doesn’t mean you are. It’d be an odd thing to bring up if you weren’t though, wouldn’t it?
@GrahamMManning: I suppose that argument can be applied to anything. Anything said out of context can be odd. It would certainly be unnatural for me to bring it up but in this case, it fits the context. Just like United Ireland’s comment fits the context. Its also relevant and justified given how people can get so quickly bent out of shape. Anyway, just my input, it all comes down to maybes and woulds and coulds.
@Dom: yup fair nuff. Does seem to be mentioned more often than not by posters whose comments could be interpreted as racist and rarely by those whose comments couldn’t?
We really need to deport the fraudsters, every bogus asylum seeker is taking the place of a genuine one.
The few genuine asylum seekers shoulsd be allowed to
We really need to deport the fraudsters, every bogus asylum seeker is taking the place of a genuine one.
€462,046 does not average out at 18 million, your 6million short on your maths. €24,026,392 a year
@Ali Ní Dhomhnaill: till September sorry too tired
@Ali Ní Dhomhnaill: lol I’d be so embarrassed omg
How many times would that get Joyce from Zurich to Dublin and back.
@Keelan O’neill: hmmm…sure he wants to come back?
“Look after our own” is very thinly veiled racism. Look closely and you will see that most decent people don’t subscribe to such apathy.
@Freezepeach: Ur profile pic is racism im calling the guard’s
@United Ireland: need help dialing the number cos you sure do when typing?
@GrahamMManning: hamMmannning go hug a tree for urself or maybe wash Ur hair & get a job living on handouts all Ur live aswell I bet
@United Ireland: such cutting insults, how will my fragile ego not crumble? Bald as a cue ball and gainfully employee as a teacher. What do u do kid?
@GrahamMManning: employed.
@United Ireland: If you change the word more to no then that’s racism.
@GrahamMManning: yawn, what a predictable narrow minded comment
@GooseSkipGoose: care to articulate how, maybe even offer some substantive input yourself?
Scammers !
@ken gray: all of em yeah?
have your say