Emigrants in Britain ‘neglected’ by State

LABOUR PARTY leader Pat Rabbitte yesterday blamed successive governments for neglecting the thousands of Irish emigrants in Britain who live in squalor and poverty.

Mr Rabbitte said governments here had failed to acknowledge in any tangible way this country’s responsibility to the generation of manual workers who supported their families in Ireland in poorer times.

He accused Foreign Minister Brian Cowen of “defending the indefensible” on the RTÉ television Prime Time programme, Forgotten Generation, which examined the plight of the neglected emigrants.

After all the years of the Celtic Tiger, Mr Rabbitte said it was embarrassing to listen to Mr Cowen on the programme claiming the €2.5 million towards emigrants in Britain somehow represented an improvement.

“The inaction on the principal recommendations of the Task Force on Emigration, published in August 2002, is a permanent stain on the performance of a government fortunate to hold office during our period of greatest wealth,” said Mr Rabbitte.

He said the Government reduced funding for Díon, a programme to assist emigrant groups in Britain, from €2.708m in 2002 to €2.573m in 2003.

The Bishop of Derry, Dr Seamus Hegarty, has called on the Government to urgently establish a support agency for the Irish in Britain, many of whom suffer from the effects of poverty, depression and alcoholism.

Dr Hegarty, who chairs the Irish Episcopal Commission for Emigrants, said: “Ireland must now give more than just lip service to our emigrants, they must feel supported.” Remittances by emigrants during the 1950s and ’60s are estimated at £3.5 billion.

The bishop said the recent budgetary provision of €1 million for emigrant services fell far short of the €18 million recommended by the Task Force on Emigration, which reported to the Government last year.

SDLP politician Paddy O’Hanlon, who chaired the task force, said they must make a start in helping emigrants soon, as the alleviation of the poverty of that particular generation was something that would not wait until next year.

He said the Government should implement the main recommendations of the report. The 18m the task force recommended was the minimum it felt was necessary to alleviate the conditions of those emigrants.