Today also sees the use of the first large scale emergency and temporary
accommodation to house those fleeing the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The Millstreet Arena in County Cork is expected to welcome 70 refugees
tonight and can be used to house approximately 300 people.
Earlier, Virgin Media News correspondent Richard Chambers spoke to
the minister with responsibility in this area, Roderic O'Gorman,
about the decision to avail of emergency accommodation.
We are under real pressure and were being up front about that.
And that's one of the reasons why the Millstreet Centre is going to be used for the
first time in Millstreet, we've accommodation for around 300 individuals.
They have kind of enclosed private living accommodation.
There will be obviously shared leisure facilities.
Obviously full meals will be provided there.
But that's been stood up for the first time this evening.
Well in studio to discuss this is Minister of State in the Department of Children, Equality
and Disability Ann Rabbitte, journalist and author Valerie Cox, Newstalk presenter Kierran
Cuddihy and political correspondent for the Irish Examiner Aoife More.
You're all very welcome to the programme.
If I want to start with you because there was a cabinet
meeting this evening and the issue of housing.
Ukrainian refugees, top of the agenda.
What did we learn?
Yeah, I think it's very much of the same we saw in the cabinet memo this evening.
Was there are concerns around accommodation now.
We knew, you know, they're very shortly.
We want to run out of accommodation.
We heard that Millstreet open tonight.
They expect Millstreet to be completely overrun by the weekend.
Um, it is coming that confessed.
We're now averaging around 400 arrivals per day.
Now that has decreased a lot from what we were seeing before we
heard that over 1000 people who had initially pledged to take
an Ukrainian refugees have now rescinded that offer.
Now, we don't know what those reasons could be.
Maybe they weren't, um it wasn't appropriate anymore.
They find people in a different way, but we know
accommodation is going to be the big thing.
There's also we're hearing about pressures on primary schools
on teachers, you know, lack of translators.
And there's also concerns now about the fiscal and the public
expenditure because we know obviously, with this very unexpected
influx of people fleeing um, Putin's war in Ukraine.
They're giving PPS in words, but there's going to be issues around tax.
And if the cost of living and the price of we know petrol and diesel
and everything continues to go up with the sanctions on Russia,
this could create more problems from us down the road.
So I feel like every week people are saying it is movable.
You know, the government is kind of working on
the hop here, but there's meetings ongoing.
They haven't been put off.
There's been no uh, no point.
As anyone said, this has to stop, but it is very movable,
and things are changing all the time.
And the demand on state services, though, is growing all the time.
Isn't it because I suppose the initial trench of people who came, perhaps
could rely on friends and family those arriving now and in the next
couple of weeks and months it will be able to do that less so, yes,
so we know that 24th over 24,000 people have arrived.
16,000 of those need accommodation, so it's a very small number that have
found the room accommodation, maybe they had a family here or whatever, and
we've also heard from the housing minister, Dara O'Brien, he said.
You know, this influx of people isn't going to affect housing for all.
You know that our plans to build all the houses that
we know that we need isn't going to be affected.
But the other issue is with these sanctions.
We know that the price of materials, everything else is going to go up as well.
I wish I had better news, but it does all just seem.
There's a lot of pressure on the system now and then
we hear Milstreet is going to be used.
What exactly is Millstreet like?
What?
What does that accommodation look like for these people?
So what we have heard is that it's, um, separate beds.
When they get there, they will get a hot meal.
There's restrooms, places to wash and shower.
It's segregated beds.
They have access to Ukrainian TV, that kind of thing.
However, this is very much a stopgap.
You know Helen McEntee, the justice minister, was out today and
she said they do not want people in this for the long term.
It's just for a couple of days, and then hopefully they can move.
I do, whether it's rented accommodation or hotels or whatever else, Um, interesting
here, though, because we're only a 25,000 at Ukrainian refugees.
We've been told we can take up to 200 thousands.
That's the quota, apparently.
And already we're having to use this emergency accommodation.
Yeah, and look, I think a lot of people and myself included, would cut the government
a huge degree of slack in terms of having to use the likes of Mill Street.
You know, maybe the objects are great, you know, people kind of being housed
in, You know, what is an arena is for show jumping at different times of
the year, but but, you know, plans had to be made on the hop.
And there's a case of any port in a storm, and I
think you can get a sense of that as well.
From like opposition reaction, there are not people out kind of banging the benches,
kind of demanding that everybody, you know, be housed overnight.
There's a realisation that it's difficult, but the difficulty is going to be
compounded the longer this lasts, you know like it is right about that.
And if we don't we only 1/8 of the overall figure
that would suggest that might come here.
And already this is where we find ourselves and I appreciate Dara O'Brien says.
It's not going to affect housing for all.
But if people are only going to stay in places like military before
being moved out into rental accommodation, that has to like you don't
need to be an economist to realise that has an impact on the rental
market, which must have an impact on housing for all.
And also it's worth pointing out that we've heard from the Fáilte Ireland
chief Paul Kelly last week saying, Look, hotel accommodation, short
term or long term is not suitable for Ukrainian refugees.
And actually, it's not a good business model for our sector, either.
Yeah, just in my actually by taxi.
On the way out here, my taxi man told me that he had Easter holidays book, do away
to count declare for over Easter, and the hotel had phoned him and said, Listen,
I'm sorry that we can take you, but the hotel has been is being used.
The government have asked us.
We're gonna be using it for Ukrainians.
We had too many people living in hotels before the invasion of Ukraine.
We know that people shouldn't be living in hotels first
off, but also we're coming in this summer.
You know, where is first?
Somewhere after Covid.
We want the hospitality and tourism sector to be back where it was.
And there seems to be no hotels left either.
Uh, are you confident that this will be a short term
measure for the Ukrainian refugees coming in?
There's no way.
I mean, if you add the figures, it just doesn't work.
I mean, I do agree with Kiran, though, that you have to cut the
government a little bit of slack on this because they couldn't
be expected to provide proper housing overnight.
I mean, that's a fact.
These numbers coming in and in fact, in other countries, I mean, for example,
I've seen it in Greece, where the refugees spent months and months, actually,
in the UNHCR 10th, you know, the big quite tense and the families lived
in them, and sadly, some of them are still living there.
But I think the big problem here is that the actual response is mostly
coming from voluntary groups, not from the government.
I mean, they're putting things in place, all right, but that is
very slow, and I'm still cutting them some slack on that.