‘We are under pressure right now’: Roderic O’Gorman on the asylum seeker accommodation crisis

Minister for Integration Roderic O’Gorman is the man at the centre of one of the most severe and contentious problems facing the State: how to handle the huge increase in people arriving to seek International Protection.

The war in Ukraine exacerbated the trend and helped scupper the Green Minister’s plan to end the system of direct provision within the lifetime of this Government, instead leaving it in perpetual crisis-management mode as it struggles to accommodate tens of thousands of refugees.

On today’s Inside Politics podcast Minister O’Gorman talks to Hugh Linehan and Jack Horgan-Jones about his handling of the crisis.

Ireland should support Ukrainians to return home by rebuilding infrastructure and possibly paying for travel back there, he says.

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The European Union needs to soon decide whether to extend additional rights enjoyed by Ukrainian refugees beyond their expiry date of March 2025, he adds.

The Minister also says he expects between 13,000 and 15,000 asylum seekers to arrive in the country annually from now on.

They discuss the struggle to accommodate such unprecedented numbers of arrivals and why local communities have not always been informed in advance when International Protection Applicants are to be housed in their midst.

Plus, Minister O’Gorman makes the arguments in favour of a Yes vote in the two upcoming referendums on care and the definition of the family.

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