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

This doesn't stack up. SF, FG and FF are on 67% combined in today's Sunday Independent poll (unless people are somehow lying about their voting intentions).

Did any of them shout at the ref?

When the polls don't show it's the number topic and the support for parties who are in favour of the current approach has significantly shifted why woukd the government be stupid enough to think it has become the number one topic?

More straw men. I am not afraid nor do I think they are any more likely to engage in criminal behaviour. There are just too many now and we do not have the housing, hosptals and other facilities to support this massive growth in population.

I haven't heard of that NGO ever. Thanks for the info.

Politicians haven't had to go to the doorsteps in 5 years. If you think housing and by extension, immigration, won't be one of the main issues they encounter, then your living a very sheltered existance. This is what you and a small cohort of posters are failing to grasp, people in the most part are not racist or against sensible immigration, people are against continuing to pile more people into a country that is in the midst of a housing crisis. If your bath is overflowing the most sensible thing to do is turn off the taps first then work on fixing the problem.

I don't think middle class Irish people that left mayo 40 years ago are selling themselves well on this matter 😂

Is number 3 considered "far" from number 1? Especially when 3 is clearly implicit in 1?

If you are claiming that anything short of a mass electoral boycott (or general strike?) signals, and rubber-stamps, 100% acceptance of current refugee/immigration policy that is both dishonest and a huge high-stakes gamble that could have massive unintended consequences down the line.

For good or ill most ordinary people are still more or less at the stage where they think of their TDs as someone who will take their concerns on board. (Are they wrong?)

My guess is that you are the product of a wider civic breakdown represented by snarling Democrat vs Republican plus Brexit political warfare (which you consume round the clock). By seeking to introduce this corrupted, all-or-nothing learned style of politics to Ireland you are trampling on the existing civic/political culture here.

So if SF, FG and FF get 65%+ of the combined first preference votes at the next general election, you are going to claim this is a cast iron rejection of their immigration policies and proof that the "Irish people" want change?

Unlike America where people will consider themselves American fundamentally, there is no shared/common European identity or heritage (the history that is there is historically bad - wars, cold wars, resentments etc).

When push comes to shove - as we saw during the Financial Crisis and the start of this migration issue - individual countries will look out for themselves. In a European context that means predominately Germany deciding what's best for it and that decision directly impacting on the rest of the bloc (for good or bad). We saw this with the "bailout" were were bounced into and now with our alleged "obligations" on migration.

This is fundamentally why the EU will never work as anything more than a trade group (the EEC it should never have mutated from). It's also poisionous to Ireland because too many people still have an innate inferiority complex and need for approval or validation from our percieved "betters", or to be told what to do - it's the EU now.. before that it was the Church... before that the UK etc.

This is why we have weak self-serving politicians like Varadkar, Martin, McEntee and O'Gorman being led by the nose by the EU and the NGOs on this issue. It's more important to be seen to be doing the "right thing" and "doing our part in Europe" than looking after the interests of Ireland and her people - especially when the decisions being made elsewhere are having devasting effects here. We've never fully recovered from the Financial Crisis (headline nonsense about Corporation tax takes regardless) and the effects are obvious in the further deterioration of healthcare and access, housing, rural investment and so on. Even though we are supposedly a "rich" country, most of these core services and infrastructures are worse than ever!

Until though we get politicians who WILL put Ireland's interests first and NOT roll over for a belly rub (or ruffle of the hair if you're Enda Kenny) from our EU "friends" though, the situation will continue to deteriorate on the ground. It's arguably already too late in some respects - the country has been changed massively in even the last 2 years and the negative effects of these policies will carry through into the next several decades (as they have in other countries further down this track).

As an electorate we need to dump the parish pump and "always voted for him because mam and dad did" attitudes and the legacy politicians with it. They haven't served us well to-date so there's no reason to expect that that'll suddenly change now. Look seriously at the options, challenge the Independents or smaller parties that appear on the list, ask them the questions that are being asked here (and all over the country at this stage) and above all... THINK.... think about what is best for your family and community and the country they will be living in not just for the next few years, but the next few decades!

It's the only way we have a chance of coming through this and the far more serious issues yet to come (again, Ireland isn't special. There's no reason to expect we'll be spared the experiences of those further down this path), and the next global recession (which is inevitable given the cyclical nature of our economic systems) will probably break an already increasingly divided EU and we need to be ready for that as well.

sounds like they'll be given a 5 bedroom house sooner or later, for free. i'd do a stint in a caravan for that.

Why is Margaret out in her PJs outfit? Puzzling.

If i didn’t have elderly parents here, I’d just get the fück out of here asap…. God knows to where, but it’s really a depressing hole of a place. Our elected representatives…. Never mind giving us the deaf ear, it’s the middle finger at this stage. It’s just not democratic. They know the majority of people are dead against this…

I hear you. I am seraching for apartments in Spain as we speak. I always planned to get a winter pad for an early retirment, but with this government letting every illegal fraudster into the country and spending our taxes on supporting them, while they give back nothing ... it has expediated my plans to spend my hard earned money elsewhere.