A proper immigration policy is needed to quell people's fears, it was claimed today.
Justice Spokesman for the Labour Party, Joe Costello, said the immigration debate needed be opened up to give people an awareness of the real situation in the country.
He was speaking after the publication of a poll in the Sunday Tribunewhich found that 80 per cent of Irish people thought the Government should limit the number of foreigners coming into the country.
"What is needed is proper immigration and residency policy - we're operating without proper guidelines or statutory basis.
"People are somewhat confused and fearful of the number of people coming into the country," Mr Costello said.
He said that the plight of the GAMA workers had shown the necessity of legislation. More than 200 mainly Turkish workers are in dispute with the company in Dublin and claim GAMA has denied them pay and is threatening to evict them from their accommodation.
He called on the Government to put legislation in place that covered immigration and residency policy.
The IMS poll for the Sunday Tribunefound that 80 per cent of respondents thought the Government should limit the number of non-Irish people it lets into the country.
Around two-thirds of those questioned said they didn't have any non-national friends and 30 per cent said they did not want their son or daughter to marry someone who wasn't Irish.
A further 43 per cent said they would reconsider buying a house if there were a lot of non-nationals living in the area.
But 80 per cent of those questioned by the poll said they thought it was good that children in Ireland were growing up in a multicultural society.
Finian McGrath, Independent TD for Dublin North Central called on the Government to provide greater and more pro-active leadership on the issue of immigration and asylum.
"What I'm very critical of is the lack of leadership from Michael McDowell and the Government on the whole issue of immigration and asylum seekers.
"What we have now is that a lot of Irish people seem to be hostile to immigrants, and we need to wake up and see that the vast majority of immigrants are hard-working people," Mr McGrath said.