Heated exchanges as Ministers told Ireland one of last countries not to change refugee accommodation offer
Ireland is among the only countries in Europe not to have changed its accommodation offering to refugees fleeing the war in Ukraine, the Cabinet was told during a heated row between Ministers on Tuesday.
Minister for Integration Roderic O’Gorman ran into opposition from Cabinet colleagues over plans drawn up which would limit State-provided accommodation for those newly arriving from Ukraine to just 90 days.
Mr O’Gorman is said to have told Cabinet colleagues who asked whether Ireland would be the first to change its system that it would in fact be among the last to institute reforms of this type.
Top News Stories
- Internal Wix chat encouraged staff to support Israel’s ‘narrative’ in Hamas conflict: An Israeli software company that employs 500 staff in Dublin encouraged its employees to create content supporting “Israel’s narrative” in the country’s conflict with Hamas militants in Gaza, leaked internal messages show.
- Visa rules stopped Derry ambulance crews responding to Creeslough gas explosion: Some Northern Ireland ambulances were unable to rush to Creeslough, Co Donegal after last year’s gas explosion that killed 10 people because foreign-born paramedics on-board did not have visas that allowed them to cross the Border, it has emerged.
- Government prepares €500m ‘backstop’ loan for Land Development Agency: The Government is preparing a €500 million “backstop” loan for the Land Development Agency (LDA) to secure its finances going into 2024, amid divisions over long-term State funding for a body critical for housing delivery.
- ‘I was given five days to leave the country’: Student at centre of deportation campaign graduates from university: For Shepherd Machaya, just getting a place in college meant everything. “I don’t want to lie to you, I started crying,” says Machaya, originally from Zimbabwe, when he recalls the moment he secured a place to study at DCU. “And it was my birthday!”
- Number of homes available to rent under HAP scheme limits at lowest level on record: Only 27 homes were last month available to rent within the limits of the State’s housing assistance payment (HAP) scheme, out of more than 900 rental properties assessed by homelessness charity Simon.
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- Ireland’s weather today: Mist and fog will gradually clear this morning. Dry this morning and for a time this afternoon with spells of hazy sunshine, ahead of cloud and rain, which will gradually move up from the southwest. Localised heavy falls and spot flooding are possible later. Parts of the north and northeast staying dry for daylight hours. Highest temperatures of 11 to 14 degrees in moderate to fresh southeasterly winds, stronger along south and west coasts.
Israel-Hamas conflict
- Israeli leaders grapple with dilemma of launching Gaza ground offensive: Israeli leaders are still grappling with the dilemma of whether to launch a ground offensive into Gaza or give more time for negotiations, in the hope of bringing about the release of some of the more than 200 hostages in Hamas captivity.
- Three killed in West Bank as world leaders seek humanitarian pause to fighting: The United States and Russia led international calls for a pause in fighting between Israel and Hamas to allow aid into the besieged Gaza Strip, as Israel maintained its bombardment of the enclave where Palestinians are living in harrowing conditions.
- Opinion - Only possible outcomes to Israel-Hamas war are a single-state solution or total annihilation: The use of spectaculars has long been a tool used by militant groups to achieve their ends: consider the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo or the 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers in New York. The consequences of these spectaculars, in both cases, were horrendous, and far outweighed the immediate effects of the original atrocity, writes Niall Holohan.
News from around the World
- Tom Emmer’s candidacy for House speaker role torpedoed by Trump and conservative Republicans: In the end an attempt by Republican Party nominee Tom Emmer to become speaker of the US House of Representative lasted little more than four hours.
- Montenegro’s president calls on EU to grant country membership: The EU can demonstrate its renewed commitment to the principle of enlargement by admitting its longest standing applicant, Montenegro, within five years, the country’s newly elected president has said.
The Big Read
- All deaths are hard but dying at sea is the worst’: Modou Boye Seck grew up hearing how his father landed his boat to become the first fisherman in Fass Boye, a small coastal village in northern Senegal. “It was in 1932. Every person who becomes a fisherman does so because of him,” he says. As a result Seck, now in his 60s, feels that the village’s traditional reliance on fishing “falls upon my head as his descendant”. It is an increasingly heavy weight to bear, writes Sally Hayden
The best from Opinion
- For the love of God, don’t make me defend Paddy Cosgrave: Eleven days in Paddy Cosgrave’s Twitter/X life reveal something beyond the fact that the former Web Summit CEO’s comment that “war crimes are war crimes even when committed by allies” was pretty uncontroversial in Irish terms or barely distinguishable from the firmly-articulated, pro-Palestinian stance of the Irish government over decades, writes Kathy Sheridan.
Culture and Life & Style highlights
- Which of 2023′s biggest hair trends will suit you?: Mullets, The Shag, Curtain Bangs and Rat Tails and Elfin cuts
Today's Business
- Web Summit clarifies leadership team after Paddy Cosgrave’s departure: Web Summit has clarified the team of executives who will lead the company in advance of its flagship event in Lisbon next month, pending the appointment of a new chief executive after founder and majority owner Paddy Cosgrave resigned from the role last week.
- Christmas doesn’t have to break the bank so start planning now: We all have that one person in our lives who brags about how prepared they are for Christmas before the Halloween decorations come down. They can barely disguise their glee when you tell them you haven’t even made a present list yet.
Top Sports news
- Gordon D’Arcy: Ireland never had the depth of players to win the World Cup: When it comes right down to it South Africa are in the Rugby World Cup final because they were able to change on the fly when things were going against them. England put in an almost pitch-perfect performance, akin to their victory against the All Blacks in the semi-final four years ago. But it was the sheer depth of South Africa’s squad that denied them.
- Seán Moran: Why do so many GAA players believe that they are entitled to attack officials?: Twelve months ago, it was put to GAA president Larry McCarthy at the launch of the Respect the Referee initiative that the “culture change” he was advocating would not happen overnight. He didn’t disagree.
Martyn Turner
Letters to the Editor
A colouring brush, not a weapon
Sir, – I am horrified by the rising death toll and near total abandonment of international law we are witnessing in Gaza. After two weeks of full-scale siege and heavy bombardment, I fear that if a ground invasion goes ahead, the worst is yet to come.
On Tuesday I received the tragic news that the eight-year-old daughter of a staff member working for Christian Aid’s local partner was killed in an airstrike that struck her home in northern Gaza. Her name was Habiba. She enjoyed art and aspired to become a doctor.
In her message, Habiba’s grief-stricken mother said: “She was carrying a colouring brush and not a weapon, she is a child with a lot of dreams. They killed her dreams and they deprived me from enjoying the light of my beautiful Habiba.”
Habiba is just one of more than 2,000 children killed in Gaza by Israeli bombing since 7th October.
At the weekend it was reported that the Israeli army dropped leaflets over Gaza city warning people that they may be considered “complicit with a terrorist organisation” if they remain in their homes.
However, many civilians, including our partners and their families remain in northern Gaza. International humanitarian law is abundantly clear – there can be no justification for the deliberate targeting of civilians or indiscriminate attacks on civilian neighbourhoods. The Irish Government and EU leaders must defend this basic, lifesaving principle.
A ceasefire is needed now before more civilian life is needlessly lost. – Yours, etc,
ROSAMOND BENNETT, Chief executive, Christian Aid Ireland, Dublin 2.
Video & Podcast Highlights
Review of the day
- My BodyFix review: Kathryn Thomas is empathetic as serious health issues shared, but the VR feels OTT: Hypochondriacs will be ready to dive behind the couch throughout Kathryn Thomas’s new series, My BodyFix (RTÉ One, 8.30pm). It’s health television meets Keanu Reeves’s The Matrix – which feels odd in the abstract and even more unlikely on the screen. And that’s before you factor in those squeamish viewers who’d rather walk barefoot on Lego than see a CGI rendering of an icky ticker – and will clench their teeth upon hearing 6,000 people have heart attacks in Ireland each year.
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