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

Dublin is getting hit worse than anywhere else in the country and these 2 clowns want more immigration into Ireland.

Do the voters in Dublin Central agree with them I wonder.

False Portugese driving licence.

Which parties are against open borders? The options are limited.

Social dems, FF FG Greens, Pb4P, Labour and the shinners are all open borders parties.

Beginning its been going on for over 25 years.

Why are we so stupid about it, seriously. Our own young people going to places like Canada, Australia, US, NZ etc on working holidays don’t rock up at their immigration desks and claim asylum, they go through the proper channels and get visas and residency documents organised in advance. If they were to claim asylum on some spurious grounds, they’d be laughed out of it and given short shrift by the sensible government policies in those countries.

Why can’t we get our act together and start behaving like a grown-up country that puts our own tax-paying citizens first? We’re importing the equivalent of Limerick city every year and can’t provide the necessary housing or other services for the existing population never mind the constant additions. What’s going on? Why do we need to be loved and seen as best boys in the class? What are our dopey politicians trying to prove?

On a separate but related note, British bank notes will no longer display figures like Churchill, Jane Austen and Alan Turing. Instead, they will be replaced by wildlife. Are we to believe that it is a coincidence that that is happening at a time when multiculturalism is surging? The Bank of England report refers to the difficulty of choosing uncontroversial figures.

It was discussed on Question Time. When an audience member raised it, saying it was a sop to the radical left, three or four of the panelists laughed in derision. A gap-toothed black man in the audience then said Churchill didn’t deserve to be commemorated because ‘he ain’t all of that’. Churchill was voted ‘greatest Briton’ in a 2002 audience poll. We all know that Churchill’s legacy isn’t without controversy, but it seems distinctly likely that the man who was considered the hero of the nation at the start of the century will have been discarded by the end because of the views of immigrants.

I have no idea what any of that has to do with this thread. The proposed change went to public consultation.

But Churchill was a stone cold White Supremacist who's views even back then rolled eyes.

I very much doubt you will get much support for him on a predominately Irish forum TBH.

I don't want to burst your bubble, but as an Indian, you really really don't want a leader like Modi. His party is notorious for using religion to rile up people and to get votes. They don't give a rats arse about equality or fairness - I am from a part of India where they haven't managed to get a strong foothold and you should see the type of vile propoganda films they are promoting to try and cause communal tentions there. I know I am saying "trust me bro", but no really, do trust me on this.

Segment on the Brendan O’Connor programme about a Muslim festival. On its own, it’s perfectly innocent. Just a curious presenter learning about a minority faith. But if you’ve been paying attention to what’s happening in England, this is the first step in a process that will inevitably end with the incorporation of Islam into Irish life. London now has Ramadan lights, lit with huge fanfare by its Muslim mayor. Premier league matches stop for a break to allow Muslim fasters to eat food. Bristol City Council had a Muslim call to prayer this week, delivered by a man who was investigated for his remarks about October 7th. Well-meaning idiots like Brendan O’Connor are going to deliver that for Ireland as well.

The person interviewed is Amanullah de Sondy. When he was last on the programme, he said, ‘There is still this idea that there is something white about Irishness. And that’s completely not logical or rational, but it is in the psyche of Irish people that to be Irish is to be white.’

He has a history of stoking ethnic tensions. In an Irish Times interview a few years ago he called racism ‘the biggest issue we face in Ireland’.

It should cause a diplomatic rift by right. Insinuating that that the UK or USA doesn't have procedures in place to protect it's citizens should be seen as some kind of insult.

By the way Pakistan, Nigeria, Georgia, Bangladesh, South Africa also have functioning governments.

Why is Ireland not following countries like Latvia, Denmark etc. Shocking

All these things that weren’t possible but turn out to be exactly that. Our government’s goody two-shoes approach to migration is enraging.

There’s an article in the Irish Times today by Eoin Drea, a European analyst. He basically eviscerates Ireland’s pretensions to diplomatic significance. We were excluded from a meeting of nineteen ‘like-minded’ EU members last month - nineteen! - but still there’s a constant flow of ‘Ireland is very concerned by’ statements out of Martin, McEntee and Harris, three politicians that epitomise blandness.

What was that meeting about?

That article by Eoin Drea certainly didn't pull any punches. Writing in the Irish Times (March 16, 2026), Drea uses Ireland’s exclusion from that specific meeting to argue that our "green jersey" diplomacy is increasingly hitting a brick wall in a more fragmented, security-focused Europe.

​The meeting he's referring to was a gathering of 19 "like-minded" EU member states held in February 2026 (ahead of the informal EU leaders' retreat).

​What was the meeting about?

​The core focus of this "19-member" group was migration and border externalization. Led primarily by a core group of "hawkish" nations—including Denmark, Austria, and the Netherlands—the meeting was designed to coordinate a much tougher, collective stance on EU asylum policy. They discussed:

​Third-country processing: Moving asylum processing outside of EU borders (similar to the "Italy-Albania" or "Rwanda-style" models).

​Returns policy: Accelerating the deportation of people whose asylum applications have been rejected.

​Strategic Autonomy & Competitiveness: While the broader EU retreat touched on the economy, this specific sub-group met to ensure that migration control was treated as a prerequisite for European security and social stability.

​Why was Ireland excluded?

​Drea’s point—and the source of his "evisceration"—is that Ireland was neither invited nor, arguably, capable of joining this influential bloc because of our specific diplomatic and legal constraints:

​The Migration Opt-out: Ireland’s unique position (alongside Denmark, though Denmark is much more aggressive on the policy side) often puts us in a "wait and see" category rather than a "founding member" category for new hardline policies.

​The Neutrality Factor: As the EU shifts toward a "war footing" and deepens security ties, Drea argues that Ireland’s traditional "neutral" stance is being viewed by the 19 "like-minded" states as a lack of skin in the game.

​Diplomatic Weight: The article suggests that while Irish politicians talk about being "at the heart of Europe," the reality of a 27-member union is that power is shifting to these sub-groups. Being left out of a group of 19—which is more than two-thirds of the bloc—is a loud signal that Ireland is being sidelined on the "big" issues like security and migration.

​It’s a sobering read, especially with Ireland preparing to take over the EU Presidency in July 2026. Drea essentially argues that we are heading into that leadership role with less influence than we care to admit.

​Would you like me to

So why then did Ireland oppose the EU’s Mercosur deal, and why are we dragging our heals on EU defence? Those are two issues deemed by Eurocrats to be at the very heart of EU prosperity and our opposition has caused much annoyance.

I once thought, like you, that the government was just narrowly focused on economic interests and therefore compliantly follows rules set abroad. But their opposition above proves to me that they are well able to risk our reputation on issues that they are concerned by. The reason they have gone along with lax EU migration policy is that it has not concerned them.

That is a fairly substantial backbone to be fair.