LAST UPDATE | 6 Jun

JUSTICE MINISTER JIM O’Callaghan has insisted it would be “untenable” to ban child deportations from Ireland despite widespread criticism after several children were removed on a chartered flight to Nigeria this week.

It comes after the principal of St James school in Dublin 8 that saw two of its pupils deported on Wednesday night criticised the decision to deport, saying that staff and pupils have been left “devastated”.

Five children and thirty adults were removed from Ireland on the chartered flight as part of the Department of Justice’s new crackdown on immigration.

School principal Ciarán Cronin had told The Journal that two of the children who were removed from the state had been pupils at his school for three years, and have in that time become an integral part of the community there.

“They’ve been part of our football team, part of our school fabric, part of our school lives,” he said yesterday.

Defending the use of deportation flights today, O’Callaghan said that deportations were “not a pleasant part of the job”, but insisted they were “a very important part” of maintaining a functioning immigration system.

“In order to have a functioning immigration system, there has to be a consequence for people who are in the country unlawfully, whether they’ve overstayed a work permit, or whether they sought asylum and haven’t been granted asylum,” O’Callaghan said.

He added that he had “heard the commentary” surrounding the deportation of children this week.

“I think the system will become untenable if we introduce rules or a new policy that says children cannot be deported,” he said.

The Minister warned that such a policy would make Ireland an outlier in Europe and could encourage more people to seek asylum here with children, knowing they could not be removed regardless of the outcome.

“It would have a very significant impact in the number of people coming to Ireland seeking asylum. So I don’t think it’s a good idea,” he added.

O’Callaghan also defended Ireland’s approach to asylum seekers, describing the country as “very fair” in allowing integration into communities, in contrast to some other countries that restrict integration.

However, he reiterated that asylum seekers must “comply” with deportation orders if refused protection.

“If you receive a deportation order, you have to comply with it. It’s not meaningless. It means something.”

His comments come amid growing outcry from opposition politicians and school officials, who criticised the government for deporting children who have been in Ireland for years and are integrated into their communities.

‘Looking to look tough’

Social Democrats deputy Gary Gannon said that children were being made “victims for a state wanting to look tough”, adding that Justice Minister Jim O’Callaghan has “serious questions to answer” over this week’s deportations.

Gannon told RTÉ Radio One’s Today with Claire Byrne that there should be a regularisation scheme for children who have been in Ireland for a year, allowing them to stay here.

“If the system doesn’t working at the moment we cannot punish the children that are over here,” he said, adding that a “compassionate” approach was needed.

Gannon also sought information on how many children are currently on deportation lists in Ireland.

He said the deportation of the children this week was “devastating”, especially for kids who were in Ireland for the past three and four years who have little

“The children on that flight, in the St James school in the Red Cow, they shouldn’t be the victims for a state looking to look tough.”

“The consequences are not only for those on the deportation flight, it’s for the other 20 odd children,” Gannon said, referring to St James School, describing it “momentously painful” for the children involved.

“They have the right to come here, if the system is taking too long that is a failure of the state, not a failure of those parents,” Gannon said.

Sinn Féin frontbench TD Eoin Ó Broin told reporters this morning that Ireland needs an international protection system that is compassionate, that is human rights based, that takes decisions in a timely manner.

Asked whether he believes it’s right to deport children who have residing in Ireland over recent years, he said that “the real problem here is nobody should be waiting for three, four or five years for those decisions to be made”.

“I think if the government took the advice that ourselves and many others, including advocacy groups for people seeking international protection, to ensure decisions were made in a timely manner, then we wouldn’t have the kind of challenges that we’ve seen this week,” the Dublin Mid-West TD said.

“But ultimately international protection has to do what it says. You’re either granted international protection, you get your right to remain in the state, or if you’re not granted international protection, you lose an appeal, and you lose the application to remain.”

Asked about criticism that the government may be trying to appear more aggressive towards migration, he said the issue was that the government had “made a complete mess” of the international protection system.

“Just like they’ve made a mess of housing, whether it’s housing vacancy or housing more generally, they’ve made a mess of international protection, and therefore we will continue to raise the concerns that we have always raised with government until they get the system right.”

People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy said he will be raising the matter in the Dáil on Tuesday, accusing the government and O’Callaghan of “performative cruelty”

“What we are witnessing is the Minister for Justice engaging in performative cruelty to boost his Fianna Fáil leadership bid. One of the most powerful people in the state kicking down at the most vulnerable and boasting about it publicly because he wants even more power”.

“It is disgusting and I will raise this matter in the Dáil when it reconvenes on Tuesday to demand an end to this performative cruelty against children and their families and instead for badly needed investment in local communities and services”.

With reporting from Mairead Maguire and Andrew Walsh