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

Perhaps immigration / refugees / asylum seekers wasn't quite as big an issue for the electorate as people assumed?

It was nearly getting overlooked that issues like cost of living, housing, healthcare, climate change etc would be just as important to the electorate. Large sections of the population don't live anywhere near an asylum centre and may not have felt personally impacted by the emergency accommodation crisis.

I see they've finally deported a guy from the Congo after 19 previous convictions. So we allow him to commit 19 crimes in our lovely country before finally deporting, what a joke of a system

Government ministers standing up saying there no link between immigration and crime is total misinformation. They are including legal migrants like French IT workers in that. The link between asylum and crime is clear and irrefutable, and adding thousands of young unidentified males to an area does increase volume of crime. Theyve already committed a crime getting here by handing their ID to a human trafficker ffs! Our citizens are supposed to face higher crime volume so some NGO activists can have nice warm fuzzy feelings?

I'd say there's a large amount of people who vote and don't follow politics and haven't really an idea of who they're voting for or what they stand for but have been told its their civic duty to vote. They might recognise a name on the ballot sheet and give a vote which gives the usual suspects a big advantage based on familiarity alone.

Sure one of my family members said they voted for Niall Boylan in the euros and a PBP candidate in the locals which doesn't make much sense. My mother voted for some Indian lad because he sent her a Christmas card.

I'd say it will vary from place to place. In areas that feel impacted by migration I imagine there will be a larger number of independents elected. It will be interesting to see how it goes. As has often been mentioned by those of us concerned about the influx of asylum seekers, there is an unfortunate lack of candidates to vote for who represent a balanced, sane view on bogus asylum seekers and illegal immigration.

For sure, it does look like some 'far right' (or whatever you want to call them) candidates will be elected in the local elections, reflecting that immigration or asylum seekers are indeed a very big issue for some communities.

But large parts of the country and the big cities like Dublin and Cork have probably been unaffected by the emergency accommodation crisis. There must be considerable numbers of the electorate who don't live anywhere even near a refugee centre or asylum hotel and who didn't feel particularly impacted by the issue - to them it might just be a remote issue or talking point.

I'd agree the Irish electorate are very nuanced and are used to voting for multiple candidates on a ballot paper. They were never going to see immigration or refugees as a black and white issue or be that energised to place it above all other issues affecting the country.

How's Gavin Pepper doing?

I'm sorry but this statement cannot be allowed stand.

It is yourself who constantly goes off topic.

Engaging in vexatious and frivolous interjection undermining the sincerity of the debate and concerns of citizens for their country

Presumably the same nonsense where people argue that unlimited immigration isn’t the problem - but access to healthcare, class sizes, budgets available and housing are - while conveniently ignoring the direct link between the two.

In what type of fantasy world situation do you think thered be one million homeless in a year?

Noticeable too that working class areas are still voting for the left : SF, PBP, independents etc and with no major swing to the right. It suggests immigration / refugees may not have been the vote winner that people were assuming.

That has definitely set the cat among the pigeons for the general election - it may be that most of the parties will focus in other key issues like housing, health and the economy and not feel the need to discuss immigration and asylum seekers much of the time.

I know ow you didn't say there will be. I asked what kind of fantasy world would it be to have that number. Are talking about the outbreak of world war 3? An asteroid hitting earth? A weather event never seen before in the history of human kind? A food shortage like the great famine? To me, those are the kinda of situations we need to have 1 million homeless within a year.

Most normal people don't base their vote on those almost never seen before situations arising. And why would they.

Encouraged by all the People who tell then they aren't Irish and never will be. There's a section of society, like many of the posters in this thread, who are very quick to point out how foreigners arent irish.

And that's fantastic, and fair play to you for doing that. It would be great if everyone was like that. Again, from what we've seen in this thread, some people here would rather sit there and tell Karim from Algeria that if he's Muslim he's a savage and a terrorised who hates women. And then they'll complain how migrants don't integrate into the community.