The Mayor of Limerick has called on the Government to issue work permits to the city's asylum-seekers as a matter of human rights.
Mr John Ryan, a Labour Party member, said he would be writing to the Taoiseach and the Tanaiste on the issue and contacting other mayors to take up the cause of relaxing the restrictions on asylum-seekers who must wait idly while their applications were being processed.
Mr Ryan has drawn up a list of people with skills after he was approached by a delegation from the 120 asylum-seekers staying at two hostels in Limerick. "They have come in to me to say they are hanging around. They have £15 a week to spend."
He said the issue was above politics and smacked of hypocrisy. "When you see that so many Irish people went to places like Boston and got on and got jobs, I am frustrated that we have a lot of jobs in Limerick we cannot fill and yet there are people with these talents walking the streets." He said the professions represented among Limerick asylum-seekers included teachers, bankers, electricians, truck drivers, mechanical engineers and nurses. "We have over 120 people with high skills walking our streets and we have industries calling out for these skills. Why cannot we match the two?"