Paul Murphy condemns asylum bill as assault on human rights

I can't remember the last time a Government brought forward a bill that was so universally condemned by human rights organisations. The Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission has said that there are substantial gaps and ambiguities in the bill in areas which, quote, directly affect the rights and safety of vulnerable applicants such as children and victims of trafficking, and that, without clear enforceable safeguards which do not exist at present, the State's human rights and equality obligations will not be met. The Civil Society Coalition and the EU Migration Pact, made up of organisations like the Irish Refugee Council, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, the Immigrant Council of Ireland, LGBT Ireland and the Irish Network Against Racism, has said that, quote, this legislation will be a stain on Ireland's international reputation, and that, quote, it undermines the very core of what being Irish means. Everyone out there should know that in this bill, Fianna Fáil, Fianna Gael and your friendly local right-wing independent TD, they are all legislating for the detention of children. Shame on you all. It should not take human rights organisations to tell us that detention is never, under any circumstances, in the best interests of innocent children. But the human rights organisations are forced to scream this out, and still you do not care. Reading through the bill, reading the reaction to the bill, it makes sense now why the government, which I could not fully understand at the time, but why the government shamefully put its name to a statement, led by Denmark before Christmas, requesting that the application of the European Convention of Human Rights to migrants be reviewed. In other words, these human rights are not human rights at all, they will be selectively applied rights, because the changes demanded here are so far-reaching that in reality it is not a review of the application of the Convention that is being demanded, but the wholesale dis-application of human rights to migrants. The socialist Tony Benn famously pointed out that the way a government treats refugees is an indication of how they would treat the rest of us if they thought they could get away with it. And that is precisely what is indicated by this bill. This is a frontal assault on human rights, in this case starting with asylum seekers, including young children. But if we tolerate this, then our children will be next. Minister, you are leading the charge in this country in attacking the legal basis of the limited rights and limited legal equality that protect ordinary working class people and oppressed groups in this state. But internationally you know that you are no leader. You are following the lead of Donald Trump and the global far-right. And we see with our eyes where this goes in the US. First ICE came for illegal immigrants, now it is executing US citizens in broad daylight on the streets of America. Protesters are especially at risk, criminalised as terrorists and allowed to starve to the point of death in Britain, brutalised and hit with trumped up charges by the Gardaí here. It is no coincidence that this appalling bill goes hand in hand with plans to create additional covert surveillance and interception powers for the Gardaí, all in the name of national security, a term your department refuses to define, presumably so that it can be interpreted as broadly as it likes. I want to go into some of the worst aspects of this bill in more detail. Firstly, it introduces a new system of border detention to be imposed even on the children of international protection applicants. We in People Before Profit are fundamentally opposed to this. Migrants are not criminals. Their children are not criminals. It should go without saying that they do not deserve to be treated like criminals simply for exercising their human right and their legal right to apply for asylum. Secondly, the bill fundamentally undermines the right to legal representation by providing only for access to so-called legal counselling. What legal counselling means we do not know. It is not defined by the bill, but we do know for certain that it does not mean access to proper legal representation, because very clearly the bill does not provide for that. Thirdly, it imposes a whole series of much tighter legal timeframes without providing the resources for them to be met. No wonder the Legal Aid Board is raising the alarm about its ability to cope. This apparent negligence is, of course, deliberate. The Government is on purpose creating a system that will not be fair in order to deport as many international protection applicants as possible, as quickly as possible, and to hell with the consequences. You know what the consequences will be, Minister. Even under the previous system, applicants have been deported to their death. In 2014, Mohamed Slaim Ali was deported from Ireland to Tanzania, where he was attacked and left to die within hours of arriving. Last June, a Congolese human rights activist disappeared after being forcibly deported and handed over to the authorities at Kinshasa Airport by Gardaí. This bill will lead to more refugees being deported, then tortured, disappeared and killed. This bill even allows for this to happen when appeals are still under way. Fourthly, all provisions in this bill and family reunification have been removed from the bill. The Minister may say that they have not been finalised yet, but that is completely unacceptable. These are some of the most important protections and must be included in primary legislation so they can be scrutinised by the Oireachtas and vindicated by the courts. Family reunification is too important to be left to ministerial regulations or departmental policy. It is a question of fundamental human rights. Again it underlines the point that the rights of children are being trampled on and ignored by this government. They do it to children with additional needs. They do it to teenagers with mental health problems. They do it to children exploited by big tech and used for child sex abuse imagery. They do it to vulnerable children who fall through the cracks. They are doing it again in this bill and they should not be allowed to get away with it.