Undocumented workers who arrive in Ireland legally but have ended up in a legal limbo through no fault of their own will be "accommodated", Minister for Justice Brian Lenihan pledged.
Speaking in the Dáil as he wound up the second-stage debate on the controversial Immigration, Residence and Protection Bill, Mr Lenihan said he would bring proposals to Government on the issue to ensure that certain undocumented workers "form a distinct category".
He said Fine Gael immigration and integration spokesman Denis Naughten and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions had made the case for the introduction of a bridging visa system for the "undocumented worker who comes here lawfully but for one reason or another was abused in respect of employment law and finds themselves in legal limbo".
He added, however, that they needed to distinguish between foreign nationals who found themselves in that position "and those who, having been refused a renewal of their residents' permissions, deliberately refuse to comply with their obligation to leave the State".
Labour's deputy leader Joan Burton described some of the Bill's proposals as "extraordinary" and called for the Government to "cop itself on".
She said when it seemed impossible to have gardaí assigned to communities besieged by crime, criminal gangs and antisocial behaviour, it was ironic that the Minister for Justice "proposes in this Bill that the officiating priest or minister, or even the guests at the wedding of an Irish person to a non-EU national could be locked up for flouting immigration laws. This is not a serious legislative initiative.
"Rather, it is a reactionary proposal that panders to those who seek a quick-fix solution regardless of whether it has been properly thought through."
Most people "will be outraged at this proposal and it must be reviewed".
However, Thomas Byrne (FF, Meath East) said the provision on marriage to non-EU nationals "is controversial but I think it is perfectly reasonable to require that the Minister be notified. He said he would revisit the matter in light of the understandable concerns expressed about penalties for those who officiate at weddings."
Frankie Feighan (FG, Roscommon-South Leitrim) expressed the hope that immigrants "can go back to their home countries and help build them up by using the knowledge they gained and the money they obtained here".
He said that "at one stage, there was no physiotherapist in the town in which I live because it was not possible to encourage anyone to come there to work. Thankfully, however, we managed to find two Indian physiotherapists who were willing to work in the town."
Mr Feighan expressed concern that many places in which asylum seekers lived were "incentive-driven establishments".
Individuals "have bought old hotels in many of our towns and have herded asylum seekers into them. In many instances, financial gain seems to be the driving motivation for the operators of these establishments."
