Immigration and Ireland - MEGATHREAD *Mod Note Added 02/09/25*

Mod - warned for discussion of matters before the courts.

he is deluded. I hope I never see the Soc Dems inn government in my life time.

I don't think he is deluded, I think he is a fraud like most lefties. Doesn't believe what he says, just looking to be lauded for politically correct statements.

I often wonder if those advocating for maintaining and even increasing immigration numbers ever consider the detrimental effect that a rapidly increasing population is having on the environment, not just here but in Europe as a whole.

Whatever about the loss of green land, we are pumping raw sewage into the sea and some rivers around the country every time there's a bit of heavy rain so we haven't even got the infrastructure to cope with our current population, and that's being forecast to possibly grow to 6.7m in 2065.

Is the plan to just keep building more and more houses, keep covering land with concrete and to hell with the implications for the environment?

I always felt that the "abolish direct provision" campaign was unrealistic and so it has proved.

Direct Provision was a cruel tool used by successive governments to temper the amount of people who sought asylum here.

Same way now the pictures of tents and asylum seekers sleeping rough have almost halved the amount of applicants.

They have had 25+ years to try and fix the system that was supposed to underpin short stay DP.

They didn't bother.

https://www.thejournal.ie/speaking-in-leaders-questions-today-mary-lou-mcdonald-said-private-operates-charged-the-government-unnecessary-vat-fees-for-unused-rooms-and-costs-of-beds-that-had-not-been-provided-6832324-Oct2025/

Big mess and rotten to the core - finally some politicians bring it up but this has been known for ages, as usual any naysayers were shouted down with facile labels and epithets

What did you think was cruel about direct provision, and what would you have replaced it with? Asylum seekers were given 3 square meals a day, a roof over their heads, a weekly allowance, the legal right to work after 6 months. They are also free to leave whenever they like if they want to seek out their own accommodation and support themselves.

I know plenty of [legal] residents here, young and old, would only love living in DP while going through college, or saving for their own house, or to retire in. I'd chose it anyday over paying to a grand a month for a crappy room in a shared house.

The population increases and so does the climate change fines reputed to be between 8 and 26 billion by 2030 .

Indeed there has, but none with the same traction and longevity as this one — which suggests that some people are either genuinely just far more rationally concerned about immigration than anything else in this life or, as I would tend to suspect, some people obsess over immigration as the funnel through which one can squeeze every last frustration about society, the economy or politics. Housing? Tackle migration and you fix that. Culture? Tackle migration and you fix that. Crime? Tackle migration and you fix that. The decline of towns? Tackle migration and you fix that. Tourism? Tackle migration and you fix that. Cost of living? Tackle migration and you fix that. Lack of services? Tackle migration and you fix that. Emigration? Blame immigration!

Indeed, it would seem sometimes from this page that tackling migration is the master key to unlocking solutions for all the major ills of our society. Sadly for us, we seem to be missing out on the Utopias created by the rightward shift of the Tory Party from 2016 onwards (with migration alarmists holding Cabinet positions), the Brexiteers, Meloni and Trump. What's even more depressing for us is that the UK looks like it could soon have Farage as PM, who will prove (unlike others of his persuasion who are or have been in power) once and for all that happiness is just a migration policy away.

Sorry? Shoehorning? Did you read the links I posted? I think the links between the issues are pretty clear unless you simply don't want to admit or acknowledge it.

Oh, and nice job throwing me into the Brexit/maga/trump/meloni bracket there. Would expect no less.

Not once did I 'blame immigration' or immigrants. My point was that, as the Guardian piece states, that Europe is losing massive swathes of green land to development of housing and roads (and golf courses) and destroying natural habitats for flora and fauna.

The other link I posted stated that the forecasted rapid population growth in Ireland will be driven by immigration and we'll also have to develop land to build hundreds of thousands of houses to keep up with demand if the forecast is correct.

Now, given that our water treatment infrastructure as one example is literally already bursting at the seams do you not think it makes sense to maybe curtail population growth (which will be driven by immigration) until the necessary infrastructure is in place.

And to be clear, I totally blame this government and previous governments for the situation we find ourselves. Not immigrants.

8 years on from when they were given access to the labour market, and they’re not even leaving IPAS centres even when they’re been given a decision on their application for international protection.

Well just over 7 years.

Do you think they are not leaving IPAS centres by choice or are they even more acute victims of a squeezed housing market?

If my family and I ended up in direct provision for years, it would probably be as a result of dragging out and trying to frustrate the whole process by withholding information, destroying our passports, or launching appeal after appeal in the hopes of being given leave to remain.

Your family didn't design the system, again that was done by successive governance as a deterrent.

Only on here though would people try make out living in DP for years is a good thing that Irish people would only be delighted to do.

You also didn’t state what realistic and achievable system you would’ve put in place instead of Direct Provision

I don't need to. DP was only ever meant to be a temporary provision.

That's all fair enough. In that case I am looking forward to seeing your thoughts on the environment in other threads which do not relate to immigration as I am presuming from your post that it is a concern for you.

Having said that, in the global rankings of population density Ireland is 142nd in the world out of 243 countries. Space versus people is not and should not be a problem. The problem is how one goes about doing things. Structurally and culturally, Ireland has been getting this wrong long before immigration was ever a topic here — with a longstanding failure to recognise and provide for the fact that Ireland is becoming an ever more urbanised country. Building upwards was neglected in favour of building outwards. High-ish rise blocks that could have housed students and young professionals were not built, so houses that young couples could raise a family in around Dublin were instead full of young professionals house-sharing — and the houses for young couples then had to be ever further out in ever further sprawl.

That's changing, somewhat, but there still needs to be greater focus (and acceptance) that building should be denser — and denser clusters of population mean less sprawl into green space. It should not in practical terms be difficult for a relatively sparsely populated developed country like Ireland to build densely, but it requires both a cultural and a national strategic change in how we imagine housing in this new urban Ireland. We finally have the other problem whereby our history as a poor island has echoed to the present day where almost every square inch of land has been claimed in some way for construction, crops or grazing — to the detriment of wilderness and tree coverage.

This is not an immigration issue — it is an issue of how we build, not necessarily how much. If the cost of living dropped tomorrow and many of our emigrants returned or would-be emigrants never left, and Irish people were having babies younger and in greater number we are still left with the reality that modern Ireland needs more housing. So it's a question of how you deal with that reality instead of trying to pretend it can be avoided by clicking fingers to adjust population to the perfect figure.