Immigration Referendum

Victor

Originally posted by irish1
Irish people travelled abroad when work was not here, but by god did they work, and if they didn't they ended up on the street. You talk about Ireland as if it's the only country that takes such measures, have a look at your country and every other country in Europe before you go on a rant about Ireland.

Aren't you blaming an individual for his country's policies?

Originally posted by arcadegame2004
"bleeding-heart" judges may (and often do) obstruct the deportation of illegal

Nice of you to label people. The reason a judge may delay a deportation is because it can then be reviewed - given due process. If someone is already deported, that cannot happen.

Look at them bleeding-heart liberal judges that postpone the death sentence in some countries. :rolleyes:

Originally posted by arcadegame2004
Over 50% of asylum-seekers don't even attend the interview process that is supposed to come after the asylum-claim is made, whererby they justify their prospective right to Irish citizenship.

There is no right, never has been for the parent to gain citizenship, no one has looked for it, no one has discussed it. What is your point?

arcadegame2004

Victor, I am aware that as part of the process of claiming asylum, an asylum seeker is supposed to attend interviews so that the veracity of their claim can be decided upon. The point I am making is that with the majority choosing not to abide by this requirement, the conclusion that must be drawn is that they either have no excuse or else, that they are trying to drag the process out so that they can put down roots and possibly have children so that they can emotionally pressure the system, political and judicial, to let them stay. This is unacceptable to me and evidently from this and other polls in newspapers, my opinion is shared by most people.

Victor

You fail to answer why you included the word "citizenship" if it is irrelevant to the parent, who may be seeking either "leave to remain" or residency.

http://www.breakingnews.ie/2004/04/10/story142249.html

Civil liberties group challenges referendum on citizenship
10/04/2004 - 8:49:36 AM

The Council for Civil Liberties says the public is being misled over the need to change the constitutional right to citizenship.

If the June 11 referendum is passed, citizenship will only be granted to babies who have a parent who is already a citizen.

Minister for Justice, Michael McDowell, claims Ireland is vulnerable to abuse from citizenship tourists.

But the Director of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, Aisling Reidy, said our constitution is far from unique, with 40 other common law countries around the world having the same citizenship rights for those born in the country.

Ms Reidy said that in the past Ireland has opted out of the chance to harmonise citizenship laws with the rest of the EU, and that there is no requirement for us to do so now.

She said that changing the constitution is the wrong approach and that Ireland needs a proper immigration policy in place before voting to change the constitution on this issue.

dglancy

I got 71 on the canada score ... see ye all in Toronto!

Phil_321

Originally posted by Victor

quote:

---

Civil liberties group challenges referendum on citizenship
10/04/2004 - 8:49:36 AM
The Council for Civil Liberties says the public is being misled over the need to change the constitutional right to citizenship.
The Director of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, Aisling Reidy, said our constitution is far from unique, with 40 other common law countries around the world having the same citizenship rights for those born in the country.

40, eh? Out of 191 countries in the world. And not one of them in the EU. The U.S.A. and Australia aren't one of 40 countries either. So that is a poor argument.

This referendum is not aimed at kicking all immigrant workers out of Ireland(which is what some of you seem to think), it's to stop the blatant abuse of the system by asylum seekers.

corley

Originally posted by Phil_321
40, eh? Out of 191 countries in the world. And not one of them in the EU. The U.S.A. and Australia aren't one of 40 countries either. So that is a poor argument.

Phil_321, I'm not sure where you're getting your facts from but you are incorrect to state that the U.S.A. does not grant citizenship on the basis of being born there. It does. (If you have a copy of The Irish Times from last Saturday (the 3rd) you'll see that it states this is the case.) In fact, so too do Canada, New Zealand, India and large parts of the Caribbean and Latin America. Citizenship on the basis of birth is actually quite common in republics.

Eoin P the Dub

In this thread in the last few hours, many posters are making claims for which they have no facts and thereby playing into the hands of the politicians in the Dail seeking to foist this upon an unsuspecting electorate.

The nature and extent of alleged abuse of our flawed immigration system is unclear: Mullah McDowell has provided little by way of evidence.

People voting yes to this referendum might want to ask themselves some simple questions: does the Constitution get changed fundamentally to prevent a few hundred people from claiming citizenship? Is our immigration system currently in place capable of meting out equality and justice to those who require it? Are all who come here to seek asylum under UN convention still entitled to due process? Are those without the right to work and for the most part without the vote to be blamed for decisions not of their making, i.e. running down public services?

Some context: passports of Irish nationals were this week confiscated before they were deported. Families are being separated before deportation, Gardai are mishandling people at every stage of this process.

Answers please?

Phil_321

Originally posted by corley
Phil_321, I'm not sure where you're getting your facts from but you are incorrect to state that the U.S.A. does not grant citizenship on the basis of being born there. It does. (If you have a copy of The Irish Times from last Saturday (the 3rd) you'll see that it states this is the case.) In fact, so too do Canada, New Zealand, India and large parts of the Caribbean and Latin America. Citizenship on the basis of birth is actually quite common in republics.

O.K. Corley, I stand corrected. The U.S.A. does offer citizenship on the basis of being born in that country.


In regards to the other countries you mentioned.... look at their locations. It is practically impossible for asylum seekers from Nigeria and Romania, the main sources of our asylum seekers, to travel to these countries to gain asylum. Except for India, but I doubt they'd get much help there.

And we're a member of the EU so I don't see why we should have a different immigration policy from the rest of the unioin.

Originally posted by Eoin P The Dub

People voting yes to this referendum might want to ask themselves some simple questions: does out Constitution get changed fundamentally to prevent a few hundred people from claiming citizenship?

Quite a lot more than a few hundred actually. From ai ing's post above:
"Data supplied by the Masters of the three Dublin Maternity Hospitals show that those hospitals alone have had 2,816 births to non-nationals in the first six months of last year."

MadsL

MadsL, you are wrong to imply that UK citizens living here face any risk of deportation after the passing of this referendum proposal. UK citizens are also EU citizens.

I'm not implying that. What I actually said was that if not for the accident of my holding an EU pasport, I could be facing deportation and never see my kid again. Don't forget that an unmarried father has very little rights in this country.

As far as my fiance is concerned, I find it ironic that a highly skillled IT knowledge worker who was brought to this country a part of a drive to fill a skillsgap, is then told to feck off once the economy hits a downturn three years later. Especially ironic when her country has accepted 70 odd thousand Irish 'citizenship tourists', in the past decade. When her President (for all his other faults) is pushing to give legal status to illegal immigrants. (including the many illegal Irish immigrants and visa overstayers) and when the 'special relationship' means that whilst the US offers all kinds of special visa programs and access to the Green Card lottery - the Irish government couldn't care less when Americans wish to reside here.

As far as the statistics that have been quoted, I admit that I was wrong about the percentage and stand corrected (It was late last night, and I was p*ssed off with Irish1) but I will say this. There may be 58% showing up pregnant, but in terms of numbers this is a very small percentage of the population. I wish the Gvt would stop talking about non-nationals in the way that equates to non-national = asylum seeker. Talking about the numbers of children that are born to non-nationals is confusing, alarmist and inaccurate. Very many of the children that are born here to non-nationals are born to legally resident EU and non-EU citizens.

This referendum is being touted as a solution to the 'problem'; the reality is there is no problem - just a slow trickle of immigrants who wish to have a better life for their children. Put in place a decent scoring system for admission in the first place, speed up the asylum process, clear the backlog and the 'problem' will disappear.

MadsL

Let's take a look at some independant measures at how much of a problem this is;
Foreign population - Ireland's ranking in europe

Net migration rate vs Europe
Net migration

Refugees

Phil_321

Madsl, look at ai ing's post:
"Data supplied by the Masters of the three Dublin Maternity Hospitals show that those hospitals alone have had 2,816 births to non-nationals in the first six months of last year."

2,816 births to non-nationals in six months is not a slow trickle.

There may be 58% showing up pregnant, but in terms of numbers this is a very small percentage of the population

No it's not when the country has a population of 4 million. For each of those 2816 births in that 6 month period you can count at least 2 people, the mother and father, and probably more children that will have to be supported by the state.


What would happen if the numbers of asylum-seekers started to rise dramatically? Is the onus on us to grant asylum to everyone who comes from Nigeria? Every Nigerian could probably say they're being persecuted in their home country(even if they're not, there's no proof) and therefore do we have to take them in?

Victor

Originally posted by Phil_321
Quite a lot more than a few hundred actually. From ai ing's post above:
"Data supplied by the Masters of the three Dublin Maternity Hospitals show that those hospitals alone have had 2,816 births to non-nationals in the first six months of last year."

Out of 60,000+ births .....

silverside

More like 10000 (60000 births per year, 1/3 of population in dublin x 1/2 a year).

Eoin P the Dub

Phil: 2,816 births to non-nationals in six months is not a slow trickle.

Let's not play a big numbers game but 2,816 in 6 months includes all EEA nationals, Americans, Oceanics, Russians, Indians, and of course some East Europeans and West Africans. Some perspective for ya!

QUOTE]

Phil_321

That's correct. From the offical proposal for the Constitutional amendment:

"The percentage of such births was between 20% and 25% of the total number of births in public hospitals in the Dublin area. The Minister has been informed that this trend has not substantially abated since the Supreme Court decision in the L&O cases.When births in other hospitals, in particular, Drogheda, are taken into account, the national figures are likely to be even higher. "

Phil_321

You're right Eoin. It's a bigger problem than just asylum seekers.

Also from the offical proposal for the Constitutional amendment:
"However, recent trends have indicated that the scale of the problem is even greater outside of the asylum seeker framework, with very large numbers of non-EEA nationals now coming to Ireland to give birth. The Minister has been informed of the growing concern among health care professionals about the rate of non-nationals coming to Ireland to give birth and the strains which this is placing on services."


These people are as Irish as Saddam Hussein. They're just exploiting the loophole in our Constitution. No other country in the EU would grant their children citizenship, thereby securing their stay in the country. Why should we?

Victor

Originally posted by silverside
1/3 of population in dublin

Well I would suspect 50%+ of the relevant population lives in Dublin.

MadsL

Stop it! I'm SICK TO DEATH of Non-national = asylum seeker.

How many births to asylum seekers last year - 3270. This is a trickle compared to the 1.3 million refugees accepted by Germany.

In the same year 20,000 Irish LEFT THE COUNTRY!

http://www.cso.ie/publications/demog/popmig.pdf

Phil_321

Originally posted by Victor
Well I would suspect 50%+ of the relevant population lives in Dublin.

Try travelling around the country, and having a look. They're not all in Dublin, they're all over the country. When I was living in Galway I saw more of the "relevant population" than I do in Dublin.

silverside

any way you want to look at it around 25% of the births in dublin are to non-nationals, some of them may to be legal long term residents, but a lot are to citizenship tourists. This cannot be allowed to continue because of the effect on our economy and society. We either allow unrestricted immigration or we dont. I think most people dont want unrestricted immigration so this referendum is the obvous way to solve it.

MadsL

Can someone explain to me why you all feel that 17,000 non EEC immigrants a year is such a big deal to you.

1. They are not taking jobs, but stimulating demand for good and services, therefore creating jobs.
2. They provide diversity.
3. They cook, serve, clean, do the nasty jobs you don't want to do.
4. We need good, heathy working indivuals and families to pay tax to shore up a health service burdened by an aging population.

silverside

I have no problem with skilled immigrants once we can decide who we want, and not have it based on whoever can sneak in 8 1/2 months pregnant, we get a lot of people from certain countries which are associated with scamming and begging, if we had a points based immigration system we would get more skilled people who could work instead of living off the government.

MadsL

unrestricted immigration

Bullsh!t. Immigration is most certainly resistricted. Go take yourself off to the Garda immigration office for an hour...most people are being refused any leave to remain.

silverside

so are you in favour of unrestricted immigration, or not?

MadsL

scamming and begging...work instead of living off the government.

Sorry I thought we were talking about immigrants, you seem to have confused it with most of West Dublin...:D

Eoin P the Dub

MadSL, you are right. Too many here confuse non-national with asylum seeker. Unfortunately, we are going to have a very unintelligent debate over the next 9 weeks about this.

In many people's minds herte in this country, they, them, those people means people from Africa and near Asia, not the vast numbers of immigrants from north America and the EU. In addition, the Government is exploiting this ambiguity to push through this thorough abuse of the Constitution.

A numbers game is not the way here. The debate is broader than numbers and goes to the core of what we are as a democratic republic with due process, justice and a set of laws which protect minorities. Those voting no against this, I think, should broaden the debate out to other issues like: why are we not getting a referendum on land prices and private property - absolutely necessary when 50% of Dublin residents cannot afford a house.

Leave Phil to it, he's hell bent on the minutiae of the numbers game, which is thoroughly detestable and ultimately unsustainable.

silverside

yeah them too...
some foreigners are skillld and work hard, some are just chancers same as some irish people, but who we let stay shouldnt be based just on where they were born.

Eoin P the Dub

Originally posted by silverside
so are you in favour of unrestricted immigration, or not?

This is such a red herring Silverside: the debate is not about unrestricted immigration but immigration. Can we please have a mature discussion on what we want as Ireland's immigration policy. No one is asking us to put forward a law allowing unrestricted immigration. Questions like this are the last resort of the indefensible.

Victor

Originally posted by silverside
I have no problem with skilled immigrants once we can decide who we want

Actually no, we need workers at all levels.

http://www.cso.ie/publications/demog/popmig.pdf 50,500 people immigrated last year, the minister appears to have a problem with 1,600 of them :rolleyes:

Trebor

Originally posted by Eoin P the Dub
why are we not getting a referendum on land prices and private property - absolutely necessary when 50% of Dublin residents cannot afford a house.

maybe because it's not in the Constitution?

anyway issues like that will have to wait to the next general election before we can vote on them.