What an illegal immigrant applying for refugee status here can expect to receive from the State

In 1992, there were only 39 applications for asylum in Ireland, compared with 5,497 applications for the first 10 months of this year. According to Ms Bernice O'Neill, an assistant secretary at the Department of Justice who has been working on asylum policy since 1997, no one predicted the dramatic jump in asylum applications from July, when the number rose from 250 a month to 1,000.

But what is an asylum-seeker and what is a refugee and what is an economic migrant? There is a lot of confusion over the difference. All immigrants, no matter what their status, are often referred to as refugees. That is not the case.

A refugee is defined in the 1951 UN Geneva Convention, a definition that has been included in the Irish Refugee Act 1996. It states: "A refugee is a person who, owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular group or political opinion, is outside the country of his or her nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself or herself of the protection of that country; or who not having a nationality and being outside the country of his or her former habitual residence, is unable or owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it . . ."

Anyone who enters the State illegally can apply for refugee status. The fact of making an application constitutes seeking asylum. Until 1997 asylum applications were dealt with by the UNHCR and this worked well when the number of applications was fewer than 60 a year.

In May 1997, following extensive consultations with the UNHCR, new procedural arrangements were put in place to deal with asylum applications. Twenty-two staff were working in the Department of Justice asylum division at that point but with the number of applications growing by the month, Mr O'Donoghue gave the go-ahead for the recruitment of another 72 staff. The total number at present is 127.

An immigrant who arrives in this State can apply to any immigration officer, or to the Refugee Centre based in the "one-stop-shop" in Lower Mount Street, for refugee status. This centre was established by Mr O'Donoghue last year. As well as applications the centre deals with appeals, houses a refugee legal service and provides for medical screening of asylum-seekers.

The Eastern Health Board also provides other services at the "one-stop-shop".

As soon as the asylum-seeker makes contact with the centre and fills out an application form, he or she is issued with a special card carrying their picture. This entitles them to claim State benefits, including supplementary welfare allowances that Irish citizens are entitled to.

Then an exhaustive process, including a detailed interview with an applicant and a checking out of each applicant's story by staff, has to be gone through before a decision on granting refugee status is made. Until such time as immigrants are granted refugee status, they are referred to as asylum-seekers.

Generally, asylum-seekers are not allowed to work while their applications are pending. However, the Government agreed in July that asylum-seekers who have been in Ireland for more than 12 months up to July 26th should be allowed to work.

According to Ms O'Neill, "it is probably no coincidence" that this regulation has coincided with the huge jump in the number of asylum-seekers coming to these shores. Only 15 work permits have been granted since July.

The definition of an economic migrant is a non-EU citizen who comes to this State to seek a better quality of life, not for political reasons. They can apply to the Department of Enterprise and Employment for work permits and more than 8,000 have been issued so far this year.

A problem with asylum-seekers is the amount of time it takes to process applications, although this has improved. Those who came to Ireland in 1995, 1996 and 1997 had to wait for up to two years for a substantive interview by the Department, with no mechanism for appeal against a refusal of refugee status.

Today, an asylum-seeker arriving in Ireland will be interviewed within eight or nine months. However, there are still more than 8,000 cases waiting for determination and the huge increase in numbers here in recent months means the Department is not clearing the backlog as quickly as it would like.

Meanwhile, the Eastern Health Board's 2,800 emergency accommodation places for asylum-seekers are full. So far this year the board has spent £28 million on accommodating asylum-seekers, often in top-class hotels, so they won't be left sleeping on the streets.

The Department of Social Welfare expects to pay out £35 million in welfare benefits to asylum-seekers by the end of the year.

According to Ms O'Neill, dispersal of asylum-seekers out of Dublin has already started to Kilkenny and Donegal. Various offers of accommodation from all over the State are currently being checked out.

The new directorate will be putting forward proposals to Government before the spring for direct provision for asylum-seekers to replace the current cash-based payment.

By April next, Britain will be one of the last countries in Europe to switch to direct provision for asylum-seekers. It is important that Ireland is in a position to change to direct provision by that time, says Ms O'Neill, or the State will be seen to be even more attractive to asylum-seekers.