Time for a zero refugee policy? - *Read OP for mod warnings and threadbans - updated 6/3/23*

Strazdas

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120169885#Comment_120169885

I totally agree on the need to rapidly speed up the entire asylum procedure and appeals process. There's no way it should be taking years to assess an asylum claim and to decide whether that claim is valid or not.

But to my knowledge, no country in Europe has the right to refuse to accept genuine refugees at its borders (in our case Dublin Airport or Rosslare Port or whatever) and deport them back out of the country on the next flight without even allowing them to make a claim for asylum. That would breach every international refugee law going. Also, the European countries at the other end of this process would quickly become very angry with us if we adopted such a policy.

Mad_maxx

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120169685#Comment_120169685

We need to understand that in terms of the numbers of people in the world who are enduring conditions far worse than anyone in Ireland, we could only ever take in a trickle of what is an ocean of global hardship

the question needs to be asked, should we risk destabilising what we have created in order to quench but a minuscule thirst of the global population looking to do better ?

we would be better not setting ourselves up as a saviour country

whisky_galore

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170296#Comment_120170296

We ignored the EU's shouts for tax breaks for multinationals to end for years, and I dont think we got spanked.

Hamachi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170296#Comment_120170296

Or put us on the naughty step? We couldn’t be having that now.

Surely the frontex database is operational by now. Asylum seekers should be fingerprinted at the airport. If their print matches a pre-existing entry in the DB, send them back to the country in which their application was initially submitted.

This is pretty remedial stuff, despite the protestations of some posters that it’s simply impossible. It’s difficult to decipher if those posters are naive or disingenuous. I suspect it’s the latter..

minimary

I think the first step we should be doing is removing visa free access for South Africa. Most of the Zimbabweans who are coming are coming on fake South African passports. Also if SA is as dangerous as we are being told by these asylum seekers then the Irish State should be thinking of the safety of their citizens and encouraging them not to travel there and should get rid of the reciprocal agreement we have about visas

herdquitter

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120166439#Comment_120166439

To me this looks like an image of the effect of low rainfall on the land.

Boggles

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170225#Comment_120170225

Interesting phrase, please don't try and attribute it to me though. You can own that one.

His daughters are adopted, that is wife in the picture.

Anyway, the point is he is not the sort of leader our own permanent malcontents would aspire to, and as you point out many of them would probably stew in their own hate at his family dynamic.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170406#Comment_120170406

What rainfall, what clouds? This is urbanization in both countries.

Hamachi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170491#Comment_120170491

There’s something really ‘off’ about sniffing around that man’s personal life and then posting images of his family in this thread.

What’s even more bizarre is then ascribing presumed attitudes to his family dynamic, to a bunch of strangers on the internet, whose own family situations are entirely opaque to you..

Patrick2010

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170254#Comment_120170254

The Lisbon treaty we signed up to gave us that right to refuse entry unless someone can quote otherwise. Surely we weren’t lied to when voting?

herdquitter

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170524#Comment_120170524

The large colour differences are showing that the UK experienced more "drought" conditions on cropland and cut grassland which hasn't has sufficient moisture to recover it's green colour.

The source thread picture caption and discussion don't support the urbanisation argument.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170548#Comment_120170548

It doesn't really have to. We learned how to read maps and aerial photography in school.

Notice a correlation?

No drought in the UK either. This photo from NASA we are discussing was from this week.

The UK saw 159.8mm of rain, which is 30% more than average. In more granular detail, England saw 133.9mm (45% more than average), Wales 199.6mm (23% more than average), Scotland 199.6mm (21% more than average) and Northern Ireland 118.7mm (3% less than average).Dec 1, 2022

Ireland also didn't experience drought this winter.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1015119/seasonal-rainfall-in-northern-ireland/#:~:text=On%20average%2C%20autumn%20and%20winter,totals%20came%20to%20328.5%20millimeters.

herdquitter

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170559#Comment_120170559

The correlation is in your head.

The thread is from six days ago, not the photograph.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170579#Comment_120170579

No, the image is literally from this week, as I said in the post you originally replied to. When did you think it was taken?

Spanish Eyes

Our President might open his Phoenix Park borders soon so....

The threats posed by climate change will raise questions about the future use of national borders to block migration, President Michael D Higgins has said.

Mr Higgins said ”the nature of the climate effect is such that it isn’t viable to be talking about borders and migratory measures in the way we did before”.

https://www.irishtimes.com/abroad/2023/01/28/higgins-questions-future-of-borders-to-stop-migration-during-a-time-of-climate-change/

herdquitter

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170592#Comment_120170592

This is the source you posted for the image

https://www.reddit.com/r/space/comments/10irlba/england_and_ireland_on_a_rare_clear_day/

The image is credited to "Expedition 67" on the ISS, which ran from March 30 - September 29, 2022.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expedition_67

Which coincided with

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/press-office/news/weather-and-climate/2022/joint-hottest-summer-on-record-for-england

And led to what you see in the image

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/england-environment-agency-nfu-thames-water-natural-england-b2143829.html

Kurooi

I'd disagree with a no-refugee policy. But I would say we need to tighten what a refugee is.

minimary

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170599#Comment_120170599

Higgins has a house in Galway (he had 2 but sold one in 2020 for a tidy profit) and a house in Dublin and lives in the Aras. He can shut up about the housing crisis and climate change until he changes his ways. Haven't heard a mention of him making any of his properties available to people in need. Hes the most champagne socialist of them all. Never mentions that he was a TD and Minister when a lot of the housing policies that are now causing chaos were put into law

Luxxis

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170661#Comment_120170661

Sensible assessment.

Slightly Kwackers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058281647/time-for-a-zero-refugee-policy

Refugees?

People fleeing for their lives?

I suppose I am a migrant having bought my Irish passport after Brexit.

One of the nicest things about leavig England was saying goodbye to the blind hate and bigotry that was the driving force for Brexit.

The "them and us" attitude is just spawning violence now and the latest disgusting scandal is the "losing" of child refugees by the home office.

The attitude being, they should have stayed home.

If you want a self centered society where everyone looks after number one, you are welcome to it.

No one rejected my Irish ancestors and more recent relatives when they hit hard times here, what on earth is wrong with giving migrants a hearing?

Some of the migrants that went to England turned out to be rotten eggs and still are, but they have been welcomed into the Tory party and are totally happy being as bad as any National Front member you are likely to meet.

What's driving the xenophobia here, in Britain it's the Tory gutter press, but I get the impression that the English tabloid garbage doesn't do so well in Ireland.

Brits used to moan about housing and services before Brexit, then after Brexit their Polish builders and care workers went home. Not refugees I know, but the reality is that the ones that complain don't know or care about the differences between refugees, migrant workers and asylum seekers.

Slightly Kwackers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120167104#Comment_120167104

The tax take has gone down. In Britain it was the same. There was a fear that in a high taxation economy the brightest and best would migrate.

Sadly not enough went. We had plenty of Engineers and Medical staff who were happy to stay and you had enough to live comfortably on even if the so called luxuries needed to be saved for.

There isn't an easy answer, but surviving in a society based on greed and keeping everything for Oneself is not to my mind a very good progression.

thinkabouit

Higgins the biggest hypocrite of all.

he wouldn’t think twice about signing off legislation that would be disastrous for Irish people for the good of the climate!

Sallywag37

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120169288#Comment_120169288

It appears I'm speaking to someone at the halfway point between a parrot and a child. I'll indulge you by repeating my own self this one time - "Pointing out the shortfalls of the present doesn't indicate a yearning for the past."

Every Irish family I know is caught between the twin pressures of the governments absurd housing policy and its equally absurd immigration policy. Anyone I know lucky enough to have a spare room has got an immediate or extended family member sleeping in it, many people have the same scenario playing out on their sitting room couch, sometimes for months, sometimes for years. Many families, including my own, have twenty-somethings and thirty-somethings never having lived anywhere but the family home - full blown adults with no concept of what independence even feels like as an experience - two straight generations of them.

People keep talking about the practicalities, and understandably so, the practicalities are outrageous, but the real issue as far as I'm concerned is the psychological impacts. Irish people are resentful, and justifiably so. That resentment is now spilling out onto the streets and growing exponentially with every scathing comment from Ireland's political, NGO and media class. Irish society is headed for a whirlwind of sh!t, and if it hits, we can thank those who are socially insulated from the mess they've imposed on the rest of us.

Strazdas

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170777#Comment_120170777

How can the Irish housing crisis be caused by refugees or asylum seekers? The overwhelming number of asylum seekers are living in direct provision centres, temporary group accommodation in large buildings, hotels, army barracks etc. None of this has any impact on the availability of houses and apartments in the State.

Geuze

Given that the public budget is finite, any money spent on DP, etc., means less money available to build regular social housing.

Sallywag37

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120170897#Comment_120170897

Where have I said that the housing crisis is caused by refugees or asylum seekers? I've said that the housing crisis is caused by a number of factors, including government policy on housing and on immigration, which has caused the population to surge from 3.5 million to 5 million in the space of twenty years. More than half of applicants for social housing in Fingal were born outside Ireland according to the 2011 article below. Fingal co Council has since stopped recording the nationality of applicants, surprise surprise. 🙄 If you don't think a population increase that dramatic and that sudden has put immense pressure on every single public service, resource and amenity, including housing, you're untethered from reality.

https://www.independent.ie/regionals/herald/news/over-half-on-housing-list-are-foreign-27973856.html

Nosler

Tbh, why import people people from cultures that aren't going to integrate into a secular democracy that respects human rights?

If an Irish person walked about Somalia, Iraq or Afghanistan etc they would get killed. Why then should Irish people be happy about Somalians and Afghans coming to Ireland?

Some cultures are just violent. Does anyone think someone's culture just changes when they cross a national border?

Strazdas

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120171280#Comment_120171280

For sure, but experts said this week in a report that Ireland will need to build 60,000 houses a year for the next 25-30 years, starting right now. That would strongly indicate that demand for housing is coming not from refugees or asylum seekers, but from the domestic Irish population. Refugee demand for housing would represent only a very small fraction of those numbers.

Sallywag37

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120171495#Comment_120171495

That depends what type of housing you're talking about. Refugee demand for private housing is non existent, for affordable housing is negligible, and for social housing is phenomenal. Do you actually think it's acceptable that a majority of social housing in north Dublin is given to foreign born families year on year as the lines of native Irish in sleeping bags and tents grow ever longer on our city streets?

Hamachi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120171495#Comment_120171495

Nonsense. The ‘domestic’ Irish population grows by ~30K annually. Net migration of Irish nationals is typically slightly positive or slightly negative. Unless every Irish national, contributing to future population growth, requires two houses a-piece, your claim is incorrect.

Future demand for housing will be substantially migration-driven. Economic migrants who will compete with Irish nationals for private and affordable housing. Asylum seekers / refugees who will primarily populate social housing lists. To pretend otherwise is utterly disingenuous, but par-for-the-course.