Xenophobic incidents increasing here

RACISM against foreign nationals is starting to manifest itself in communities around the country, according to the head of an immigrant support network.

Integrating Ireland’s director Aki Stavrou said anecdotal evidence was mounting that migrant workers were increasingly experiencing verbal abuse and discriminatory attitudes.

He said within certain communities messages were being sent – and it was that foreigners were not wanted anymore.

“It is more xenophobia than racism. People are starting to say, ‘why are you still here, it is time to go home now’,” he said.

“Immigrants are experiencing much higher levels of discrimination now than ever before.”

Mr Stavrou said it was very upsetting for the people on the receiving end, especially younger people.

“I heard a story firsthand recently of a Latvian school girl who was been told by her classmates that ‘they’ should all go home now.”

Meanwhile the head of Cork-based Immigrant Support Centre Nasc expressed concern over the lack of reporting of racist incidents.

Gertrude Cotter said staff were concerned that people were not telling anyone about what might be going on.

“Sometimes people are afraid or they don’t know where to go. We would encourage people to report any incidents, if they do not it is not recorded and that makes it very difficult to do anything.”

The rationalisation of the National Consultative Committee on Racism and Interculturalism in April’s supplementary budget, she said, was also very disappointing.

“This committee recorded racism and worked on research and developing policy on integration. Its work was said to be subsumed into the office of integration, but its 12 staff were laid off so it is difficult to see how it could be. A lot of EU funding was lost because of this too.”

Ms Cotter added that there had been a “significant” change in the attitude of the Department of Justice in its immigration and integration policy.

She said it had become apparent from dealing with the department that it was taking a much harder line on a variety of issues which affected immigrants living in Ireland

“They might not sound significant, but for the people involved it makes life much more difficult.”

One example, said Ms Cotter is that it is getting harder for spouses of Irish citizens to get a spouse visa.

For example, an Irish national trying to bring a married spouse into the country has to prove the history relationship in much more detail than before and people trying to bring children in is also a problem, she said.