News that the Government has been forced to put on the back-burner its proposal to use floating reception centres (flotels) for asylum-seekers is a further indication of the problems it is encountering on this highly sensitive issue. In recent weeks, there has been an outcry from communities around the State where it is proposed to place reception centres. Protests have been made, with some justification, over lack of consultation and, regrettably, there has been much opposition in principle to hosting refugees at all. The Government, throughout this difficult period, has been both slow and inexact in explaining its policies and would seem to have drawn little encouragement from the liberal public attitudes to refugees as indicated by the recent Irish Times/MRBI opinion poll.
The flotel proposal is one element of a comprehensive plan announced in March by the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, to deal with the reception of and integration of refugees. The plan attracted hostile comment from those opposed to reception centres which the Government did little to counter. Now, the port authorities would seem to be forcing the Government into a U-turn on flotels.
In the Cabinet discussion, Progressive Democrat Ministers argued against flotels following the controversy over the Taoiseach's failure to rule out detention centres on his recent visit to Australia. Other ministers found the association between flotels and detention centres too close for political comfort. But disagreement among Ministers has been rendered inconsequential by the port authorities who, influenced perhaps by local opposition, have made the decision for the Cabinet.
The Department of Justice however is insisting that the Minister has not abandoned the flotel proposal. Seemingly, he told the port authorities recently that he expects them to overcome their reservations on sewage, berthing, tidal conditions and fire safety. Mr O'Donoghue's exhortations are all very fine but he knows well that he cannot force the port authorities to set aside their reservations.
Mr O'Donoghue outlined, in March, the need for 8,000 short-term places to accommodate refugees and asylum-seekers, including 4,000 in prefabricated buildings, 2,000 in hotels, guesthouses and hostels and 1,000 in mobile homes. The construction of 4,000 places of permanent accommodation would proceed "as quickly as possible". Details as to costs or locations were sparse and have since emerged fitfully in an ad hoc manner, often indeed only as a result of decisions to disperse asylum-seekers to specific towns and villages.
Regrettably, this reflects quite accurately the grave failure of political leadership the Government has displayed on the refugee question. That vacuum has been filled all too often by vocal but largely unrepresentative xenophobic or racist voices rejecting the presence of refugees seeking sanctuary. Only belatedly have other voices, such as churches, employers and trade unions come forward to counteract the critics.
The findings of the Irish Times/MRBI opinion poll should give politicians and leaders of society courage to take back the initiative in favour of a more inclusive and welcoming approach, including the issue of regularisation as suggested by four Catholic bishops. The Government's decision to all but abandon the use of flotels is to be welcomed. But it is a pity that rather than recognise how inappropriate they were, a decision had to be forced on a dithering Cabinet by the port authorities.