MacGill summer school: Minister for Justice Michael McDowell last night called for a more balanced debate on immigration.
"There is a middle way. People like Labour leader Pat Rabbitte, for instance, in his remarks about Poles coming to Ireland, obviously saw political advantage in echoing a sentiment that is unspoken but is there. It is that somehow migration is threatening prosperity and the position of Irish people."
Addressing the MacGill summer school, the Minister said there had been a traditional left-right analysis of immigration issues which was wholly inappropriate in the modern age.
"The traditional left-international view is that all migration is good, and that everybody has a right to be where they want to be.
"The right-wing view is that all migration into Ireland is bad. Between those views, the vast majority of Irish people have followed a middle path.
"In general terms, our experience of migration has been remarkably positive. With the exception of the Love Ulster rally, there has never been an occasion where there was street violence unleashed on people because of the colour of their skin to any significant extent. It was interesting, in that context, that it was people who regarded themselves as extreme nationalists and republicans who dragged out Chinese and Asian workers from the workplaces and beat them up on the streets."
Mr McDowell said there was now "visible" and "invisible" immigration into the Republic. "You know when you are speaking to a Lithuanian or a Pole, but you do not see them on the street when you pass them by, while the Chinese, Africans, the Indians and the Asian emigrants are visible.
"And the truth is that visible migrants are, in fact, roughly one-quarter or one-third of the invisible migrants. That is something which is not taken into account in many of the discussions on the subject.
"When people talk about racism, nobody does so in relation to Poles or Lithuanians or whatever."
General secretary of the Ictu David Begg said it had been naive of the Government to think that employers, faced with the prospect of an abundant supply of vulnerable, and understandably compliant, labour, would not succumb to the temptation to exploit them.
"That, of course, is what happened. Initially it was below-the-radar-screen activity in horticulture, hotels and other low-pay industries. But the issue burst into serious public prominence with the Gama and Irish Ferries disputes."
Lucy Gaffney, chairwoman of the National Plan Against Racism, said that for migrants nowadays home was never far away. Air fares were cheaper, while the internet and mobile phones provided instant communication.
However, there were hardships, particularly for people in the developing world where flight from persecution or dire economic necessity drove people to desperate measures.
