The refugee committee of the Irish Bishops' Conference has valuably brought to public attention dangers involved in plans to impose heavy fines on those transporting undocumented migrants. They have also strongly criticised the use of Irish Ferries employees to vet passports and other documents on the route from Cherbourg to Rosslare, which they say has the effect of pre-emptively excluding asylum-seekers from applying to come here.
Their report is a fitting reminder on the first World Refugee Day, to mark the 50th anniversary of the UN Convention on the Status of Refugees, that Ireland's policies in this sphere leave much to be desired.
The bishops' call for an amnesty for the 13,400 asylum-speakers trapped in an administrative backlog is a humane way of recognising that and giving all concerned the opportunity to put more acceptable procedures in place. The bishops argue that heavy on-the-spot fines for each undocumented passenger brought to Ireland would force ferry and airline staff to become proxy immigration officials. Asylum-seekers frequently have to resort to false documents and this does not disbar them from seeking refuge on the grounds that they are fleeing persecution "for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion", as the 1951 Geneva Convention puts it. Such fines would also encourage underground illegal traffickers.
It is all too easy to acquiesce in a system that renders an issue invisible, as the "outer frontier" in Cherbourg seems to do. As a result, far fewer people have presented themselves for asylum in Rosslare than last year. The bishops point out that this is not necessarily because of a reduced number of people trying to come to Ireland with valid claims for asylum, but because they are now prevented from doing so.
This is worrying for anybody who takes this issue seriously. There is evidence that other states, such as France and Germany, apply stringent conditions, especially concerning people fleeing persecution by non-government forces such as paramilitaries or religious fundamentalists. Ireland accepts such fears as good grounds for seeking asylum. The Government tends to shelter behind practices introduced throughout the European Union, increasingly co-ordinated as they are. These often make it much more difficult to apply the rights built into international covenants and to respect the integrity of those who seek asylum for genuinely good reasons.
Ireland is still learning to come to terms with the flow of people seeking refuge here, as with the flow of those seeking work in a much more developed and prosperous economy. This report adopts a radical approach and should act as a wake-up call saying it is unacceptable to disguise or hide the issue of refugee rights in such fashion.