Wexford social services `seriously strained' by asylum-seekers

Social services in Wexford are "seriously strained" by the numbers of Romanian asylum-seekers housed in the town, the Labour Party deputy leader and local TD, Mr Brendan Howlin, said last night.

"Wexford people are very welcoming, but you shouldn't create pressure points or people will act resentfully," he said. The town does not have emergency accommodation, and people had to be put up in B&B accommodation, he said.

This morning South Eastern Health Board workers will try to house a group of 47 Romanians, including 20 children, who arrived in Rosslare on Thursday. Last night they spent their third night in sleeping bags in a St Vincent de Paul hall in the town.

"Just because we are a ferry port town all the pressure lands on top of us," Mr Howlin said. "I'm concerned that so many people can get on containers in Cherbourg to make the dangerous and difficult journey to Ireland. There seems to be no check in France. And there is the potential for a calamity, because people can die in these containers."

The group of 47 people, comprising 11 families, plus a further seven men who arrived on a freight ferry on Saturday, bring to 210 the number of Romanians housed in and around Wexford. Seventy-two people are in private rented accommodation, 20 are in a county council house outside the town; the remainder are in B&Bs.

One health board worker said that without the help of the St Vincent de Paul on Thursday night there would have been no place to accommodate the 47 new arrivals. The society had also organised food for the families.

Plans were being made last night to find accommodation for the group, who indicated initially that they wanted to stay together. Speaking through a translator one man said they were not insisting on being housed together.

The health board has assigned a full-time worker to deal with asylum seekers. There is no translator in the area other than those Romanians already here who have good English.

However, gardai and health board officials have to rely on their goodwill, rather than being able to employ them as translators. As asylum seekers themselves they are not permitted to work.

Gardai have criticised facilities at Rosslare, describing them as abysmal. On Thursday night the group of 47 had to line up on the concrete concourse used by lorries, before being taken to Wexford.