Migration and Citizenship: Statements Dail Éireann — 2026-09-30 ============================================================ Sinéad Gibney (SD), Dublin Rathdown I welcome today's opportunity to discuss migration and citizenship because although this is an issue that dominated public discourse in 2024 when we were all engaged in the election, it has receded somewhat given the geopolitical tensions that are abounding and the energy and cost-of-living crises. I just do not think we are simply talking about it enough, particularly in light of the actions of this Government since it came in. I feel very strongly that we have seen a series of cruel, performative measures which are set out to a create a picture of this Government being tough on immigration without reasoned evidence. That to me is the hallmark of the Minister, Deputy O'Callaghan's ministership so far. When we try to dig for an understanding as to why these measures are being introduced, there is no evidence for them and that to me is part of what we talk about when we talk about these cruel and performative measures. I am proud to be part of a pro-immigration party. It is not easy because the other thing we have to call out right now is the rise of fascism and anti-immigrant sentiment, not just in Ireland but the world over. Before I became a politician, I was heavily involved in the work around human rights and equality, particularly on the topic of international protection. I can tell the Minister of State that groups such as Doras and the Migrant Rights Centre Ireland, MRCI, that are fighting for migrant rights and people in the international protection system, and defending the right to claim asylum, come under huge attack, but it all pales into insignificance compared to the overt racism and discrimination experienced by migrants in this country. That is the context in which the Government has chosen to take this direction in its term of office in terms of migration and citizenship. I talk about cruel decisions. The one we are dealing with in the Government's current strategy around moving from five to eight years is just ridiculous. It is five years already, plus another two years by the time it is processed, so that is seven years. Moving it to eight years is essentially moving it to ten. These are people who are contributing to our society. They are paying taxes. They are working. They are integrating and the Government is simply moving the goalposts on them. People who had expectations around when they were going to have citizenship have had their lives upturned by this decision. I urge the Minister of State to rethink it. Believe me, I want the Government to reverse the decision, but at the very least offer those people who are already in the system the clarity and consistency that they expect on their naturalisation path towards citizenship in this country. It is a cruel decision, but it builds on multiple cruel decisions the Government has overseen in terms of harder rules around family reunification and the asylum and migration process, which the Social Democrats believes pose major threats to people's ability to claim asylum in this country and the international protection process itself. The Minister of State talks about the system being "firm" and "sustainable", and all of those words always go before "fair", but our system was never fair. We never even reached the conditions we were supposed to meet under the reception and integration directive of the European Union before we moved towards this more "firm" and "sustainable" model. However, the worst part of all of this is that it is such a waste and suck of energy. I worked in the international protection space. Part of the changes that the Government is looking at now is around the threshold for earnings, for example. I know it is a separate system but it is related to the same area. When the right to work in the international protection system was introduced by a preceding government that included the Minister of State's party, it was chaos because the thresholds did not make any sense. All of these NGOs that I mentioned had to fight to get a proper realisation of the right for people in the international protection system to work. Even then, most people could not realise that right because they did not have access to a driver's licence or bank accounts. All of the energy in the organisation that I worked in, which is a State organisation, plus the entire migrant rights sector, is being placed into pushing back against the Government's regressive measures, instead of where it should be going, which is the actual integration of these people who are holding up our hospitals and our health system. They are people who we are neighbours, friends and family with. The Government's cruel measures are making life more difficult for them every single day that it chooses to take this tough on immigration stance that is "firm" and "sustainable" while failing to implement anything of the fair and rights-based system that it should be looking over. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-09-30/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:00:59+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-09-30