Irish Refugee Council chief Nick Henderson has called for the immediate transfer of 68 children from City West refugee treatment centre.
Mr Henderson told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland that the council had “very serious concerns” about the children, who are in a “shared environment” with 700 adults with very limited play, washing and toilet facilities.
On December 1, the council wrote to the government recommending that the children and families be moved out of City West immediately. The Refugee Council has also called for the center to be closed in the long term, but Mr Henderson acknowledged that this should be done gradually.
Mr Henderson said he believed it was possible to find alternative accommodation for the children and families, as was recently the case for refugees staying in tents.
No step should be taken to exclude shelters from the scrutiny of any future regulator, he urged, as that’s where children are most at risk.
In a letter to Minister Roderic O’Gorman, Henderson expressed concern about the state of the hub. The council had visited the site on November 11 and found “grievous risks”.
He said the risks that exist, particularly for children, “should be the most urgent concern” for the ministry and the government as a whole.
“In our opinion there exists in Citywest a risk of harm to children, owing to a total lack of privacy in terms of accommodation, the co-mingling of unrelated adults and children and the lack of experienced and trained child protection personnel on the ground,” the letter read, RTÉ reports.
The letter draws attention to the fact that on-site showers are not segregated by gender or age, which has been described as “extremely inappropriate”.
The letter also described what he described as “chronic overcrowding.”
Data released in response to a parliamentary inquiry by independent TD Catherine Connolly showed that as of that day last week, 68 of the 764 applicants for international protection housed at the Citywest Convention Center were children.
The original capacity of the center bed was 370.
The Department for Children, Equality, Disability, Inclusion and Youth said on Friday that the Citywest Transit Hub will be closed to accept new Ukrainian refugees from December 24-27.
Ukrainian Ambassador to Ireland Larysa Gerasko confirmed that she would discourage Ukrainians from traveling to Ireland until mid-January due to the housing shortage.
Tell us your thoughts in the Facebook post and share this with your friends.