Asylum seekers deserve the right to cook for themselves

Asylum seekers deserve the right to cook for themselves, writes Sharon Ní Chonchúir.

WHAT do you eat when you wake up in the morning? For most of us, our chosen breakfast is likely to include some of the following: a bowl of cereal with milk, buttered toast, eggs, sausages, rashers and a cup of tea or coffee.

Now imagine you were no longer allowed such a breakfast. You have had to move to another country and you are not allowed to cook for yourself. Instead, you have to eat rice, fermented cabbage and tripe stew for breakfast and more unfamiliar food for lunch and dinner. Most Irish people would be culturally and physically disorientated by such a change. No more potatoes? How would we cope without our most comforting foods? Yet this is what we ask of many of the 4,278 asylum seekers living in 34 direct provision centres run by the Reception and Integration Agency (RIA). Often fleeing conflict, violence and trauma, they are housed in these centres until their application for asylum is either granted or refused.