THE DEPARTMENT of Finance urged the immigration authorities earlier this year to ensure the deportation of unsuccessful asylum seekers “as quickly as possible” to reduce the cost of supporting them.
In a briefing paper prepared for the McCarthy expenditure review group in April, officials noted while the numbers of new asylum applications had been declining in recent years, there was no corresponding fall in the number of people living in asylum accommodation centres.
The document attributed the rising costs of these centres – the total allocation in 2008 was €91.5 million – to difficulties encountered in trying to remove unsuccessful asylum applicants from the State, with “almost every proposed deportee fighting every step through the courts. A priority should be put on ensuring that those who fail in their asylum applications are removed from the State as quickly as possible,” the memo advised.
“While the cost of removing certain groups of failed asylum seekers is relatively expensive . . . it outweighs the cost of accommodation and certainly of incarceration in the State.”
Charter flights to Nigeria have in the past cost the State up to €270,000. According to official figures, 176 foreign nationals have been deported to their countries of origin so far this year – more than were expelled in the whole of last year – while a further 167 have been transferred to other European states.
Some of these removals have been co-ordinated by Warsaw-based EU border security agency Frontex, which organises joint deportations between member states and allows them to share travel costs. In its own submission to the McCarthy group, the Department of Justice expressed confidence the Immigration, Residence and Protection Bill, currently making its way through the Oireachtas, would provide a “faster removals process” and shorten delays across the system.
However, the Human Rights Commission, the Law Society and other bodies have raised concern about the potential impact of the Bill’s provisions for summary deportation and new limitations on access to judicial review. The UN refugee agency has warned sections of the draft law allow for a person who might be in need of protection to be summarily sent to their country of origin without their claim being properly examined.