Justice Minister Helen McEntee has decided to withdraw from the British Irish Intergovernmental Conference (BIIGC) scheduled today in London, as confirmed by her representative. The decision came after a meeting with UK Home Secretary James Cleverly, which she planned to attend during the BIIGC, was called off by the British authorities.
McEntee plans to engage with senior officials in Dublin today, expressing regret over missing out on the BIIGC meeting, which the Tánaiste will participate in. She is also keen to reschedule her meeting with the Home Secretary soon, as stated by her spokeswoman this morning.
While she won’t be attending the meeting, various senior members of her team are already in London for the intergovernmental conference. The government will be represented solely by Tánaiste and Foreign Affairs Minister Micheál Martin.
The proposed meeting between Helen McEntee and UK’s James Cleverly was unexpectedly postponed late Sunday evening. McEntee’s spokesman announced that the Monday afternoon meeting with the British Home Secretary in London has been delayed and will be rescheduled shortly.
The Home Office informed the Irish Department of Justice of an inescapable clash of schedules. The meeting was planned amid a diplomatic tiff between Dublin and London over migrant transit across the border, with the Department of Justice estimating that it encompasses over 80% of all global protection applicants.
On Sunday, Taoiseach Simon Harris declared that Ireland would not act as a “loophole for anyone else’s migration difficulties”. This statement came in response to UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s claim that the increase in migration into Ireland demonstrated the success of his government’s contentious plan to move asylum seekers to Rwanda for processing. He added, “Every country is allowed to set its migration policy. However, I certainly won’t let another country’s migration policy compromise our own.”
Speculation is rife among the political fraternity in Dublin, postulating that a meeting might have been delayed to enable the situation to cool down. The two ministers were initially intended to talk about making the Common Travel Area function in a more efficient manner and additionally, discuss strategies to curb any misuse of it. The British side, however, appears to find the Irish interventions disharmonious, while the Irish side sees Mr Sunak’s remarks as needlessly provocative.
As per the information from a Dublin Government source, the British government is just three days removed from an election, implying some political influence in this development.
Simultaneously, Ms McEntee is in the final stages of drafting legislation that would facilitate the repatriation of asylum seekers who entered the country via the Border. The plan is for Ireland to start sending back asylum seekers to the UK right after the emergency legislation is enacted, thereby allowing the recommencement of returns.
One proposal under consideration by the Government is to send people arriving from the UK back to either the UK or their original homeland after undergoing processing here. This, according to some sources, could serve as a significant deterrent.
The remarks by Mr Sunak triggered an intense response among Coalition figures over the past weekend, who are of the belief that the Conservative UK government is deliberately highlighting the influx into Ireland for their own political advantage.
The development comes amid concerns raised by the Irish Refugee Council over proposals by the Government to expedite the return of asylum seekers from Nigeria in response to a sudden rise in applications, most of which are suspected to be from the UK.
Nick Henderson, CEO of IRC, indicated that although the State has the power to speed up applications, those from Nigeria cannot be treated similarly as applicants from a country on a designated list where processing is simplified. He raised concerns about any accelerated processing of these applicants without access to legal aid, which could be problematic.
A source from the Government, however, suggested that from a human rights viewpoint, faster processing times can definitely be seen as a positive move. The Government had also contemplated putting Nigeria on the safe country list in 2023, although this has not yet been realised.