The number of immigrants seeking advice on redundancy increased seven-fold in the past year, a new report revealed today.
Almost 500 people contacted the Immigrant Council of Ireland about job losses compared with just 70 calls in 2008.
“We have heard rhetoric about the recession taking the urgency out of the need for immigration reform because migrants are supposedly going home,” chief executive of the council Denise Charlton said.
“There are lots of people who are not going home, they’re Irish now or they’re married to someone Irish or their children are Irish.
“What makes up the Irish population has changed for good and despite the recession we still have to ensure that we have a system that can respond to that.”
Ms Charlton also called on the Government to ensure immigrants signing-on for unemployment benefits would not be at a disadvantage when applying for citizenship in the future.
“We need the Government to make the system clearer and to make an exception where if someone has been accessing social welfare and has been paying into that pot they’re not then penalised later in a long-term residency application,” she added.
The council said around a fifth of its 10,000 enquiries were about work permits and issues around renewing status.
The ICI received calls from 150 nationalities this year along with queries from more than 250 organisations.
Most enquiries came from Nigerian nationals, followed by Irish, Chinese, South African and Indian.
The council said many queries from Irish nationals were from people with partners or family members from outside the EU.
PA