Wanted: a reasoned look at citizenship issue

The alleged threat to Irish citizenship from maintaining the status quo is unconvincing, argues Peter O'Mahony

The alleged threat to Irish citizenship from maintaining the status quo is unconvincing, argues Peter O'Mahony

Some 60,000 babies were born in Irish hospitals last year. Though this is far from a record high in modern Irish history, a perception has grown in recent years that maternity hospitals in the capital have been at breaking point.

The surprise decision in March this year to hold a referendum on citizenship was initially justified on the basis of the "pleadings" of the masters of Dublin's maternity hospitals. The said masters soon distanced themselves from any responsibility.

It also emerged that fewer than 1 per cent of all of last year's newly born babies countrywide were born to women who were non-Irish nationals and who had first turned up in an Irish maternity hospital in the very late stages of pregnancy.

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By April the justification for the referendum had changed. The entitlement to an Irish passport of the babies of foreign mothers with no known pre-existing links to Ireland apparently constituted a threat to the "integrity of Irish citizenship".

This suggested threat seems unconvincing given what the resilient Irish passport has survived over the years. Nobody questions the commitment that Messrs Aldridge and Cascarino, for example, gave to the green shirt having "become" Irish well into adulthood.

Nor was there a rumpus when the great Zimbabwean golfer Mark McNulty got his Irish passport. A shadier past had seen the precious passport linked to the Iran-Contra scandal while the "passports-for-sale" era remains fresh in our consciousness.

Ireland has long offered citizenship to all children born anywhere on its soil. While this is unique in the EU, a few dozen other countries, including some with far higher intakes of immigrants, have been able to survive and prosper despite - or because of - offering citizenship as a birthright. The US and Canada are two such, and many of their current citizens are descendants of Irish ancestors, while American citizenship allowed Eamon de Valera to escape execution in 1916.

Suggestions of long-standing EU concern about Ireland's approach to citizenship are backed up by little evidence. As there is no EU law forcing Ireland to change, it would seem that the decision is one that Ireland alone is worrying about.

Interestingly, being out of step with the EU in a plethora of other areas including, for example, childcare or public transport has not resulted in any headlong rush by Ireland towards standardisation.

The arrival of women in very advanced pregnancy with no records in the Irish health system is undeniably a challenge to maternity hospitals that cannot be entirely dismissed as purely a resource issue.

However, there is sadly a lack of any published research on the reasons individual women, at a time when they more than ever need a caring environment, have been willing to uproot themselves and travel to a country that is alien and potentially hostile.

Tens of thousands of immigrants, seeking refuge from persecution in the countries they have fled or who are here as economic migrants, such as nurses from the Philippines, are legitimately resident in Ireland. Many of them are of childbearing age, and the carrying of the referendum would inevitably mean that increasing numbers of babies living in Ireland would not be citizens of this country.

Whether or not the Constitution would protect the rights of non-citizen children will only be determined through the courts in future years, but case law to date offers no such guarantees. Allowing children to be born on an equal footing promotes tolerance and lessens the "difference" factor for the child born of immigrant parents.

The rush to hold the referendum in conjunction with the local elections and the strident dismissal of any reasoned arguments against this are not proof of racist intent.

It can, however, be safely assumed that, in its reflections, Government anticipated gaining real electoral advantage and adding to the confusion that exists on immigration issues as Noel O'Flynn TD so successfully did on a previous occasion.

This inevitably means that the climate for immigrants risks becoming much more hostile, and it is notable that the National Consultative Committee on Racism and Interculturalism (NCCRI) pointed out at the end of April that there had been an increase in the number of racist incidents reported in recent weeks.

The referendum is yet another ad-hoc and short-term measure that takes the place of a comprehensive and forward-looking immigration policy. Though Ireland's capacity to manage the changed reality of immigration has developed in recent years, the lack of a cohesive policy to deal with immigration and the failure by Government to deliver on a long-promised immigration and residency bill are serious failures.

An indication of a general Government aversion to consultation and allergy to alternative viewpoints in the immigration and human rights areas can be found in the summary dismissal of arguments put by groups including the Government-appointed Human Rights Commission. An issue of particular concern to refugee groups is that, though asylum-seekers are legally resident in the State, time spent in the asylum process would be excluded from the calculations of whether or not a refugee's child was entitled to automatic citizenship.

This seems discriminatory, especially where the speed of processing of applications for refugee status or for leave to remain, while improved in some cases, remains far too slow in the case of others, even though the total number of new asylum applications has fallen dramatically since 2002. (Last year more people sought asylum in Slovakia, Greece or the Czech Republic than in Ireland.)

One refugee I know was in his fourth year at the asylum-seeking stage before his refugee status was eventually confirmed in 2003. Another spent over a year waiting for the decision on his interview to be fed back to him.

Ireland faces a number of challenges in adapting to the huge changes in the country over recent years. However, the alleged threat to Irish citizenship from maintaining the status quo is unconvincing and is a poor substitute for a reasoned and comprehensive look at all issues related to citizenship in modern Ireland. For my part, I'll be saying "No, thank you" to the proposed change.

Peter O'Mahony is chief executive of the Irish Refugee Council