State will have to answer for 'institutionalisation' of direct provision

The Kinsale Road direct provision centre. File Picture: Jim Coughlan.

Direct provision is a continuation of institutionalisation in Ireland in the 21st century that the Irish State will one day be held accountable for, according to two university lecturers who have worked closely with people in the system.

Dr Jacqui O’Riordan of the School of Applied Social Studies at University College Cork, and Mike Fitzgibbon, lecturer in international development at UCC, have been working with asylum seekers since the mid-'90s.

The duo has called for the direct provision system to be shut down, and for asylum seekers to be treated in a more humane manner while waiting for their asylum application to be processed.

Direct provision was originally intended to be a temporary system that housed asylum seekers for no more than six months while they awaited a decision on their asylum application. However, the system has endured and has housed many asylum seekers for years.

While the Government has committed to phasing out direct provision, a paper on how this will be achieved has been delayed until February, having initially been due for release in December.

Dr Jacqui O'Riordan and Mike Fitzgibbon. Picture: Jim Coughlan.

Speaking to the Irish Examiner, Dr O’Riordan and Mr Fitzgibbon described direct provision as a “continuation of State institutionalisation in Ireland in the 21st century”.

“It is a form of institutionalisation that the State will be held accountable for, and there will be no room for the State to say that what is happening was unknown,” said Mr Fitzgibbon.

Children are living out their childhoods as institutionalised children. Adults are being re-traumatised, and adults and children alike are being degraded within a system that views them as less than human."

The two UCC lecturers presented a paper to the Development Studies Conference in recent years, where they described the direct provision system as “State terrorism”.

Dr O’Riordan explained that “the characteristics of terrorism are present in the structures imposed on the lives of residents of direct provision”.

“Words used by residents to describe their lives informed this description – lives lived in ‘anxiety’ and ‘fear’ subjected to ‘intimidation’ and ‘threat’,” she said.

Both Dr O’Riordan and Mr Fitzgibbon criticised the original reasoning behind the direct provision system.

“The State’s excuses and reasonings began as an initial, unprovable ‘pull factor’ – that providing humane facilities for people seeking protection would act as a magnet to all,” said Mr Fitzgibbon.

“These [excuses] have progressed through ‘value for money’ rationale – that the DP system was the best economic answer, based on problematic research that excluded most realistic better options, such as people living independently – through to the current blaming of the State-created housing crisis on the lack of movement.

“None of these excuse the inception and continuance of State institutionalisation, and the destroying of the lives of children and adults,” he concluded.” 

A spokesperson for the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth said: “The Programme for Government contains a commitment to ending the Direct Provision system and replacing it with a new International Protection accommodation policy, centred on a not-for-profit approach.

“The Government has also committed to the development of a White Paper which will set out how this new system will be structured and the steps to achieving it.

“The Department is currently developing the White Paper on Direct Provision which is expected to be going to Government in February,” he added.