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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
The Clare Byrne Show on Newstalk. With Aviva Insurance.
The EU has promised to increase deportations of undocumented migrants under a new law that critics say mimics elements of the Trump ICE-style immigration crackdown. Let's get more on this. I'm joined by Regina Doherty, Fine Gael MEP, and Eoin O'Riordan, who's Labour MEP. And you're both welcome to the programme, Regina. Regina, I'll start with you.
People will remember back, good morning to you, when Boris Johnson's government announced their Rwanda plan. And then when Donald Trump came to office and we saw those scenes where ICE agents were tearing schoolboys away from their fathers and putting them both into separate detention centres, we watched on with horror. And now the EU is going to do the same thing.
Chapter 2: What are the new EU laws regarding immigration enforcement?
Not probably exactly. And what this is and what was agreed on Tuesday night is the final part of years of negotiations of a new coordinated migration pact. And I think they left, obviously, probably the most difficult part of it until the end. And it is about what you do with people When they've gone through the entire legal process and get a negative response at the end.
And what we know over research of the last number of years is that one in five people, when they get that piece of paper to say you're not legally entitled to stay in Ireland or the European Union anymore, leave. But four in five of those people don't. and they either abscond or they go into the invisible community where, you know, they live and work in the black economy.
Either way, it's the part of the process that have people has undermined trust in the last number of years. And so what we need to do is to have a coordinated approach as to how we deal with those four people who were refusing to leave on their own. But actually what that means is number one, every one of the 27 member states has to have the same rules and apply them evenly.
But we also have to have deals for want of a better way of putting it, with the countries to be able to return them to. Now, the reality is that with an awful lot of countries, we don't have a deal. Afghanistan is one in point.
Now, actually, personally, I don't think it's a safe place to send anybody back to, but just using it as a case in point, we don't have a legal way of sending somebody back to Afghanistan if they've come here and we've decided that it isn't, you know, legally possible for them to stay within the EU.
What the Migration Pact does and what we agreed on Tuesday night, it gives us a uniform set of rules to talk about how we return people who've at the very end of a process have got a negative. You're not allowed to stay. So what we do with you and how we do it.
So then you could send them to, under these rules, a country where they've never been. They've no ties to.
So effectively, now that wasn't part of Tuesday nights, that was part of a previous agreement. Yes, we do have now a legal right to be able to send somebody to a third country if that's, you know, what we deem necessary. Because I think the main point about restoring the trust and the confidence in our immigration system
is making sure that we have a fair, firm and compassionate system and that when we have rules, we actually adhere to them. It makes no sense whatsoever if at the very end of a lengthy process, you've been determined that you don't have a legal right to stay within the EU for us to say, oh, well, you know what,
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Chapter 3: How does the EU's approach compare to the Trump administration's ICE policies?
That rule doesn't really apply. So we'll lax that rule and allow you to stay for a couple of more years. If you don't have a legal basis to stay, then we have to have a proper coordinated mechanism to be able to actually put you outside of the border.
So Aon, only 20% of people who have no right to stay in the EU are successfully returned to their home countries. And the EU has said this has to be dealt with. What is the problem as far as you see it?
Well, unfortunately, what has happened is that the European People's Party, of which Fine Gael are a member, have decided to rip up the convention of centrist politics, where the S&D, which is my group, the Labour Party's group, the Greens and Renew, which would be Fianna Fáil's group, that held the centre ground
There was always an understanding that we would hold the centre ground, work with each other and move forward with progressive politics and policies.
We're going to have to improve that line. It is just failing on us. So we'll get you back on a better line. But can we address that point, Regina, that this is all about politics, that the EU, after the last European election, moved to the right and the European People's Party had no choice but to go down this road as a result?
So what this is all about is responding to the fact that we have a system within the EU that up until now hasn't been coordinated, hasn't been enforceable and has caused major issues within the citizens, not just of Ireland, but right across the European Union. People don't have trust in the system anymore. They don't have confidence in the system.
And unfortunately, because of also additional misinformation, we now have a situation where we have an emotional response and a lot of the time probably not healthy. So what we need to do is to restore confidence in a migration system, to first of all send out a clear message that absolutely nearly every country in the European Union needs migrants.
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Chapter 4: What is the significance of the coordinated migration pact?
We need them to support our economies, to work in our jobs and our hospitals, our schools. All have been rehearsed, but that's really important for us to say. Also to say our doors are open for people who genuinely need asylum.
But if at the very end of that asylum process, you aren't deemed to have a legal right to stay within the European Union, we have to have a coordinated way to, first of all, know where you are. If you don't leave, we have to have a coordinated way to make sure that you do leave. That's what restores the confidence in the system. And you know what? I don't mean to be disrespectful to Aon.
Fighting over whether I voted with the right, whether I voted with the left, what we did was we found a common ground within the European Union. And I'll also remind listeners, so did the European Council, where an awful lot of S&D prime ministers sit, particularly Denmark, for argument's sake.
We found a common ground to find a solution to respond to the people that gave us the mandate to be sitting in the EPP, to sitting in the European Parliament, to respond to a crisis where we have a system where people don't have any trust in it anymore.
The most important thing we can do is to have a fair, firm and responsive system that looks out to the people that we protect, but it's also fair to the citizens of the nations that we represent that it is also enforceable where people don't have a legal right to stay in our country, that we have a mechanism to be able to remove them.
OK, to come back then to Eoin on this. I mean, it would seem reasonable, I think, to a lot of people that if you've been through the asylum process and you have been told and you may have appealed to the original decision and been told again that you have no legal right to stay in an EU country, it seems fair and reasonable that that person would be sent back to where they came from.
Can you hear me now? Yes, absolutely.
No, no, it's all good.
Yeah, look, my frustration, which I was saying earlier, is that this is another example of Fine Gael's group in the European Parliament making deals and cutting deals with the far right, which they never did in the past. So whereas we used to have progressive, centrist politics between the centre-left and the centre-right, they come up with pathways which were compassionate, understanding,
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Chapter 5: How does the EU plan to handle undocumented migrants?
which was, you know, in keeping with what they're trying to do in America. Even today, sorry, in the Irish Parliament, it is reported about the chief executive of the Irish Immigrant Council saying that the government is placing far too much emphasis on migration issues. to such a degree that it's going to hurt the economy. So I just don't understand this obsession.
All right, well, Regina, can you address that accusation? I could, of course. So he says you're talking outside of both sides of your mouth, essentially, depending on which side of the Atlantic you are.
I don't believe so. So first of all, the political engagement that goes on between the Irish government and the undocumented in America... is the right thing for us to do as a state. The problem is, is that an awful lot of people who come to the European Union, we don't have relationships with the countries that they come from to have those political engagements.
What I know, when I was sent to the European Parliament, is that more than half of the Irish people think that migration is one of the most pressing issues that we have and they want us to address the issue with solutions. That's what my party has done over the last number of years, is to negotiate solutions that gives a fair, firm and enforceable migration system.
And to cut a lot of nonsense that Éanna said, this is not about stopping anybody from coming to work, to live, to study in the EU in a legal way.
This is about our asylum process, which in a lot of countries has been overwhelmed in the last number of years, to find a way that when you're at the very end of that legal process, because you're allowed to apply for asylum for any reason in any country, at the very end of that legal process, if you've been refused
Surely to God, it isn't reasonable or unreasonable to expect us to have a uniform way to say, I'm really sorry, you don't have a legal basis to be in this country. We're going to have to remove you.
So it's fair then for Irish people who've established lives, even though they're undocumented in America, to be told the same thing.
I didn't say it was fair. What I'm saying is, is that we have a route to politically engage on behalf of Irish citizens living in America to try and actually formulate something that's legal to settle those people in America. That's an ongoing engagement and you know it's been going on for generations. What we don't have is those equal relationships with countries where people are coming from.
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Chapter 6: What challenges exist in returning migrants to their home countries?
And actually, even when you see that when we try and have political discussions, most recently with Afghanistan, there's blue murder goes up and flags get raised. So we have to find a mechanism where we can control our borders.
And when people come to the European Union, and at the very end of a legal process, get a negative decision that, no, I'm really sorry, you don't have a legal right to stay here.
We have to find a way to make sure that those four in five people who are currently absconding and living in an undocumented manner and causing pressures on our systems and causing emotions and political problems for every single country in the European Union, which is why the European Council have supported this And this is why I expect the European Parliament to support this deal on Tuesday.
That's what we've attempted to do.
This mechanism includes putting people in detention centres for up to 30 months. And I wonder, are you comfortable with all of this?
So, first of all, the only way anybody can be detained is after a judicial order or a warrant, which is not what Eoin has just said. We have a rules-based system. You can't just rock up to somebody's house and knock on the door and take them away. So there has to be proper UN charters of human rights and the EU fundamental rights. All will be upheld.
But if we have a whole load of people who have no documentation, who've arrived here and said that they were from one country, but don't have a passport to prove it. And we can't like we can't have a situation where countries have been overwhelmed. We've had our own difficulties in Ireland in the last number of years. You can search people's homes.
You can search people's homes or other relevant premises.
It's a outrageous language. It's fair. It's overwhelmed. I mean, are we serious? Are we serious in allowing somebody to use that language that countries are being overwhelmed?
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