The appalling human tragedy in Wexford at the weekend dramatically illustrates the contradictory attitudes applying to migration and refugee policies in Ireland and the European Union. The nine people who died in a container sent from Zeebrugge last week and the five survivors were prepared to risk their lives with ruthless human traffickers to find a better life. Europe and Ireland increasingly will need immigrant workers to do the jobs left vacant by greater prosperity and shrinking populations. But much more political effort is being put into erecting fortress-like border controls to keep migrants out than into developing policies for orderly flows of immigration to meet demands for labour. Such tragedies will recur until this contradiction is addressed and resolved.
There has been a generous response to the tragedy in Wexford and nationally. Local political and religious representatives such as Mr Brendan Howlin TD and the Bishop of Ferns, Dr Brendan Comiskey have constructively raised these policy issues along with their expressions of sympathy. That shows real leadership on such a sensitive subject so open to prejudice and short-sighted popular attitudes. The Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue and the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern concentrated on the human traffickers who profit so much from this misery and on tougher measures to stop them. Such an approach is certainly necessary, both at national and EU levels. But it is inherently limited unless the underlying factors driving the trade in people are tackled.
People throughout the world are on the move as never before, driven from their homelands by famine, natural disasters, civil wars, state collapse and by the deepening gulf between the richer and poorer countries. Reports that the victims discovered in Wexford may have come from Romania or Turkey show how close these problems are to us. Too great an emphasis on fortress-type policies designed to stop migration and exclude refugees is likely to exacerbate them in the longer term. While this may ingratiate political leaders with xenophobic sections of their populations intractably opposed to immigration it opens up dangerous currents of racism and prejudice, impoverishing increasingly multicultural European societies (including Ireland) that have benefited so much from hard-working newcomers. The Wexford tragedy recalls the image of famine emigrants in Ireland; but at least those who left this country were free to go elsewhere in search of a better life.
A balance must therefore be found in Ireland and the EU between strengthening borders, controlling human trafficking and enabling access for migrant workers. As Mr Howlin says, issues arising from economic migration and from the humane treatment of refugees have become confused and should be separated. It seems incredible, given the increase in the extent of trafficking, that pre-inspection of containers before they are shipped to Ireland should not be standard procedure. A common EU arrest warrant that could be used to apprehend those who smuggle people illegally across borders makes much sense and will be decided upon this week. Such practical measures will help tackle this problem. But they need to be accompanied by a much larger vision about the factors driving desperate people into the hands of traffickers in what is now a worldwide trade in human suffering.