The number of asylum-seekers coming to Ireland has continued to grow in spite of a crackdown by the Government aimed at illegal immigrants.
Refugees continue to arrive here at the rate of about 100 a week, according to the latest figures from the Department of Justice. These show that 2,312 people sought asylum this year in Ireland to the end of July, compared to 1,480 to the end of May. The total for the whole of last year was 1,179 and for 1995, 424.
Tighter immigration controls have been in place since the end of June, when the previous Minister for Justice, Mrs Nora Owen, effectively abolished the free travel area between Ireland and Britain. Immigration officers can now question anyone suspected of seeking entry to Ireland through another EU state, and send them back.
The upward trend coincides with concern among groups working with refugees that the Government and the Department will not implement the Refugee Act passed by the Oireachtas over 14 months ago.
The Act, which provides for the modernisation and streamlining of the system for processing asylum applications, cannot be brought into force until a High Court injunction brought by the former Minister for Justice, Mr Patrick Cooney, is lifted.
Mr Cooney is challenging the validity of the competition to fill the post of refugee applications commissioner, as provided for under the Act. It is understood this case will not be heard until the next law term, which starts in October.
Officially, Government sources say they are still committed to the Act, which was largely the work of the former Labour Minister of State at the Department of Justice, Ms Joan Burton.
However, suspicions are growing that the Department wishes to set aside some of its more liberal provisions. "There certainly seems to be an unwillingness in the Department to implement the Act unless it's amended," comments Ms Mary Lawlor, director of Amnesty International.
The appointment of a refugee applications commissioner was to have been the last step needed before the Act was implemented. The last Dail, at its last sitting, had already assented to a new international convention governing the movement of refugees within the EU. Extra staff have been taken on for the commissioner's office.
The commissioner would take over the processing of applications for asylum and would issue recommendations to the Minister for Justice on whether to grant them or not. The advertisement for the position last January required applicants to be practising barristers or solicitors with at least seven years' experience.
An official of the UN High Commission for Refugees is currently in Dublin on a temporary basis. One of his main tasks was to have been the provision of assistance when the Act was implemented, but now it seems the post may not be filled until next year.
The Eastern Health Board says the number of asylum-seekers coming to its offices has fallen in the past few months from 100 to about 70 per week.