Time for a zero refugee policy? - *Read OP for mod warnings and threadbans - updated 11/5/24*

So the democratically elected government in Ireland is desperate for more refugees?

The government elected by your colleagues friends and family.

The likes of Germany and France build high rise apartment blocks very quickly when pressure on housing occurs. They build them out in the not so pretty small cities, often you will never see these as a tourist. I lived in both these countries and drove a lot for work , I would see them fire up these tower blocks in a matter of months. Ireland cannot do the same due to planning regs, environmental objections, incompetent local authorities and totally useless housing department / government. And I'm not saying I'd like to see tower blocks dotted all over Ireland, but some 5 to 8 story complexes can be well designed and fit in to the surrounding urban area.

Every large town (not even a city status) in Germany & France have a small hospital, day clinics, swimming pool, fire station, city hall, police statiin, etc. There were even technical colleges and Universities in very small cities. Huge hopsitals in every small city. The list of facilities and infrastructure goes on.

By living and travelling in Germany & France (and the US), You can totally appreciate how small Ireland is in terms of space, infrastructure, facilities, housing, etc. I can list the major hosptials and Universities in Ireland in 20 seconds, you could count the no of fire stations in Connuaght on one hand, the number of Garda stations in Ireland equate to a tiny district in Germany.

This is why Ireland cannot grow like our large EU neighbors can, its why Ireland has to control immigration.

high rise social housing apartment blocks, as in 10 and 12 stories which would be considered high rise in Ireland, are all over central areas of Paris and London anyway very visible to tourists if you get around a bit. Off the top of my head I can think of such towers in Notting Hill, St John's Wood, Shoreditch, Waterloo, Bermondsey, and around Oberkampff and Parc Buttes-Chaumont in Paris, I'm not that familiar with Paris though.

it just doesn't seem to be possible to do this in Ireland with our planning regulations and constant objections. I was impressed to see a load of apartments being built here in central Dublin last time I was home, and also similar developments around that new Pelletstown train station. Even if we can't do high rise, block after block of this kind of thing, with room for amenities and shops etc. that are helped by the government to stay in business, should be the direction we're going in, in my opinion.

Name a single country in the western world that has ever used immigration laws to try and stop the population from growing? If the Irish government truly believed this was the way to go, they would go the route of the Brexiteers and withdraw from the EU and the Single Market (and in the same stroke, would kibosh the chances of Irish people being able to move to anywhere in Europe).

Every country that requires a visa to enter, stay or work

Seems to some sort of stand-off occuring in Mullingar tonight

https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2023/03/24/protesters-blocking-bus-of-asylum-seekers-from-entering-columb-barracks/

It's ridiculous to be abusing the bus driver for doing his job. If people have an issue with refugees they should get on to politicians instead of abusing a man out earning a living.

These folk aren't exactly the sharpest tools in the box tbf

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Any suggestions on who the vote should go to instead?

Yes I do. There's an awful lot of very dissatisfied people out there and they definitely can make gains.