Inspectors who visited asylum-seeker accommodation centres across the State found serious breaches of rules set down by the Department of Justice, according to the most recent inspection reports.
A flooded bedroom, cockroaches, fire doors wedged open and the potential for serious cross-contamination of meat were among the problems identified in the reports, which were prepared by staff at the Reception and Integration Agency (RIA) and external assessors.
On the day in May last year when an inspector visited Millstreet accommodation centre in Co Cork, a water pipe burst and water from it was running into a resident's bedroom.
Water from a second burst pipe was flowing into the yard outside, while "many taps are constantly running and cannot be shut off", according to the inspector.
At Viking Lodge, a centre for 70 people in Dublin city, an inspector noted that a fire door was propped open, that mushrooms were growing from a corridor wall and that there were shortcomings with cleanliness and decor in 26 out of 28 bedrooms. After a subsequent inspection last November, an official said the fact that residents were smoking in their rooms presented a "major fire risk".
Last February an inspector who visited Hatch Hall, a centre housing about 190 adults and children in Dublin, wrote that broken chains on two third-floor windows meant there was a "risk of [ a] child falling out of the window".
Cockroaches were found and subsequently eradicated in a resident's room at Kilmacud House in south Dublin.
The reports from randomly selected accommodation centres in Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Donegal, Kerry and Sligo, which were released under the Freedom of Information Act, show that the RIA is generally satisfied that the centres are well-run.
Balseskin Reception Centre in Finglas, Dublin, is reported to be operating "very satisfactorily" and Globe House in Sligo is a "very well-run centre".
However, an external inspector who assessed conditions at the Cliffview centre in Donegal town in June last year found no kitchen hygiene records, no evidence of kitchen staff training (except fire training) and no evidence that an environmental health officer had visited the premises.
Moreover, he found that in the main fridge, "dripping meat is still defrosting above non-dripping meat" and said there was "potential for serious cross-contamination".
The owner subsequently disputed these findings in correspondence with RIA officials and none of the issues was raised in a subsequent report.
The chief executive of the Irish Refugee Council, Robin Hanan, said the reports "confirm some of our long-term concerns" but suggested that the inspection system was overlooking "significant shortcomings in the management of the centres".
