Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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45. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth to provide an update on plans to house direct provision, temporary and international protection applicants in reception centres; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26057/24]

Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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I ask the Minister to provide an update on plans to house direct provision, temporary and international protection applicants in State-run reception centres. It is moving away from the issues that exist with the private sector, whether the loss of hotel beds as regards the D Hotel and other hotels throughout County Louth and across the State. There are probably other places that are not that suitable and I understand the issues in the Minister's Department. The sooner we can do this, the better.

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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As the Deputy knows, on 27 March 2024, the Government agreed a new comprehensive accommodation strategy, CAS, for international protection applicants. This has a twofold aim. The immediate aim is to deal with the situation where we are not able to offer accommodation to everybody right now, and a significant number of people were sleeping rough on our streets. The secondary aim, as the Deputy said, was to move away from that massive over-reliance on the commercial sector and have a core of State-owned accommodation. We are looking at a number of strands in terms of how we deliver this. There is the use of State land for prefabricated and modular units, the conversion of commercial buildings, a targeted purchase of medium and larger turnkey properties, design and build of new reception and integration centres and the upgrading of existing IPAS centres.

From 2028 onwards my Department plans to achieve the following composition of accommodation. This includes State-owned reception and integration centres and accommodation centres, at national standards with an overall bed capacity of up to 13,000 beds. We would have a further 1,000 beds in-community accommodation for vulnerable people. We would also have contingency accommodation with bed capacity up to 11,000 and emergency accommodation with a bed capacity of up to 10,000.

As detailed in the updated strategy, accommodation will be delivered through a blended approach looking at a number of strands, whether purchasing turnkey properties or primarily delivery on State-owned sites. My Department launched an expression of interest, EOI, process on 30 April 2024 for the sourcing of suitable properties. The EOI seeks to identify properties for acquisition under the following criteria. The properties would have more than 150 beds. The bedrooms would be in line with national standards. There would be existing properties or buildings in turnkey condition, or existing properties that would require some degree of upgrading or refurbishment. Again, my Department is also working on existing State-owned sites to convert them into reception and integration centres.

Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Will the Minister provide further information on the timeline? We would all welcome that there needs to be a move away from the private sector. Some of the locations have been utterly unsuitable for all. It is fair to say we have to do whatever we can to look after people who are fleeing dreadful sets of circumstances and the rest of it. However, we need to get a system that works and that is sustainable. That also means improving processing times. The Taoiseach and others have used that term. When that happens it reduces the numbers coming. Everything is exacerbated by the accommodation crisis and the huge number of people seeking temporary protection before we had a spike in international protection. There is a need to get this piece done as quickly as possible.

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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I agree with much of what the Deputy said. We have to remember we are rebuilding our international protection system in real time. For years we were not getting anywhere close to the European average for international protection applicants. Since 2022 we have been getting the average, but our system was not built for those numbers. We are having to rebuild the processing system. The Minister, Deputy McEntee, has done really important work. In my Department, we are rebuilding the accommodation system. It is important to note that prior to the comprehensive accommodation strategy being published, we had a significant number of male international protection applicants sleeping rough in our streets, from Christmas into March. Since then, more than 1,000 additional male applicants have been offered accommodation. There are still some people sleeping rough. We have not solved this problem yet, but we have been able to bring more than 1,000 people into the system, the vast majority of whom were sleeping rough between December and March. That is a significant achievement.

Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Has the Minister further information on the timeline and when we will see this move occurring? That is obviously accepting that as things happen there needs to be a huge amount of planning work done. There has to be interaction with those communities where some of these are to be located. Suitability has to be at a premium. Beyond that, will the Minister say where we are as regards improving the efficiency of the system and faster processing of those from safe countries or from where we have a significant number of people coming? There is a wider issue related to work permits that needs to be looked at across Europe. There is also a wider issue of what the western and eastern powers have done to destabilise the Middle East, Africa and other places. That is something that needs to be addressed.

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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The comprehensive accommodation strategy is to run until 2028. The vision set out in my answer of 13,000 beds and the various elements is something we wish to achieve by 2028. We have already taken significant steps in the use of State land. That has been a huge change. There is the site at Crooksling, County Dublin, and at Trudder, County Wicklow, where we are now accommodating a significant number of applicants. They are initially being accommodated in tents, but we will look to upgrade the accommodation to prefabricated rapid-build units. We are also looking to bring forward significant accommodation on the Thornton Hall site, which is another State-owned accommodation site. We are looking at two other existing sites at Athlone, County Westmeath, and Knockalisheen on the border of counties Limerick and Clare to improve and bring additional capacity and upgrade those to reception and integration centres.

The issue of processing is primarily one for my colleague, the Minister for Justice. She has put in significant investment over the past two budgets and has been able to dramatically shorten processing times. I think she would recognise there is still more work to be done. Part of that is signing up to the EU asylum and migration pact, but very significant progress has been made in that area.