To ask the Minister for Justice, Equality & Defence, in relation to hostels, hotels and holiday accommodation contracted to provide accommodation to asylum seekers, have Ministerial Orders been used to exempt each property from the necessity to obtain planning permission for the change from short term holiday use to long term residential use? When was the last such order made and did the Minister of the time ensure that the situation justifying his use of an emergency provision in the Planning and Development Act was still existent?
- Senator Trevor Clochartaigh
Reply by Minister of State, John Perry T.D.
I am responding to this adjournment motion today on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Justice, Equality and Defence, Mr. Alan Shatter, T.D.
The first point to be made is that the Reception and Integration Agency (RIA), a functional unit of the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service (INIS) of the Department of Justice and Equality, is responsible for the accommodation of persons while their applications for international protection are being processed. Currently, there are 4,735 residents in 35 accommodation centres contracted to RIA throughout the State. Of the 35 centres in the State, 7 are State owned. That is to say, while the centres are managed by private contractors under contract to RIA, the land and buildings are owned by the State. Details of all of these centres are available on the RIA website – www.ria.gov.ie
The situation regarding planning permissions in each of these centres is not uniform and reflects the evolution of RIA’s procurement policy over the years which I will explain later. To get to the point of this motion, three ‘system built’ State owned centres which are the responsibility of the OPW are covered by Ministerial Orders under section 2(2) of the Local Government (Planning and Development) Act 1993; two of the commercially owned and operated centres, Mosney, Co. Meath and Balseskin, in St. Margaret’s, Co. Dublin are also covered by such Ministerial Orders. The remaining thirty centres – four State owned which originally operated as hotels and hostels and twenty six commercially owned and operated centres - operate on the basis of their own planning permissions which are subject to compliance procedures from the relevant planning authority. The commercially owned centres are subject to a standard clause in the contracts they have with RIA as follows:
"It shall be the responsibility of the Contractor to ensure that the premises complies and operates in accordance with all relevant statutory requirements of Local Authorities and other Agencies in relation to planning, building bye-laws,…….etc"
In relation to the Minister Planning Order issued 14 June, 2001 for Balseskin this arose because the centre was commissioned, built and operated specifically as a Reception Centre for asylum seekers following a tender competition run by the OPW. The issuing of a Ministerial Planning Order for this commissioned centre was necessary given the urgency of the situation then prevailing in relation to the number of asylum seekers arriving in the State. Similarly, given the pressing need for bed spaces and the size of the centre being contracted - and it remains the biggest centre – it was decided to issue a Ministerial Planning Order in respect of Mosney. That issued on 30 November, 2000.
For a more detailed account of the procurement and planning processes in operation at that time, I would commend to the Senator Chapter 4 of the 2002 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General which report is in the Oireachtas library.
In explaining the history of RIA's procurement policy from the start of the direct provision system, it would be wrong to ignore a salient point. That is; in a lot of cases asylum accommodation centres are not welcomed initially by local communities. Controversy and significant local opposition arose almost immediately in respect of some of these properties – both State and commercially owned – with some local communities expressing fears about the arrival of asylum-seekers in their neighbourhoods. In certain instances, local residents exercised their right to challenge the use of the properties through the courts on planning grounds. Such opposition was particularly costly in the context of the procurement of State owned centres. The last State owned property procured by RIA was Atlas House, a hostel, in Killarney - in January 2002.
Since then, RIA policy has been to procure commercial properties -hotels/hostels/boarding colleges etc. - from private operators through public advertisements seeking expressions of interest. As already explained, this involves existing premises in the private sector where the contractor is required to operate in accordance with all relevant statutory requirements, including those relating to planning.
The Minister is of the view that the direct provision system is a necessary component of the State’s immigration policy and that the Ministerial Planning Orders are still required. Plainly, if RIA and the OPW were to consider new State owned centres, or the replacing buildings in existing State owned centres, then legal advice would be sought on whether the use of the Ministerial Orders referred to above would remain appropriate.
Finally, it is worth noting generally the decline in the number of persons seeking accommodation in the RIA system in recent years which has necessitated the consolidation of the accommodation portfolio. At the end of 2008, RIA was accommodating 7002 persons in 60 centres. At the end of 2012 RIA was accommodating 4,841 persons in 35 centres. During that 4 year period RIA had closed 25 centres and was accommodating 2,161 fewer persons. In that same period, spending on the RIA system declined from €91.5 million to €62.3 million i.e.32%.
ENDS