Irish families suffer from failure to legislate for Family Unity
The Irish Constitution enshrines the importance of the family, recognising the family as the ‘natural primary and fundamental unit’ of society. However Irish citizens and legal residents have no legal right to bring family members, such as spouses or children, from other parts of the world to live with them here in Ireland.
In practice, the Irish Immigration and Naturalisation Service (INIS) often will provide family members with residency permission, but it is done – like the majority of INIS decisions – on a purely discretionary basis. This means that the process can be extremely difficult, time-consuming and convoluted for people to navigate and in the end there is no guarantee that you will be able to bring your loved ones to Ireland.See our Family Unity campaign page for more information.
Nasc has supported numerous clients who have encountered serious difficulties in trying to live as a family due to the current framework for family reunification decisions in Ireland. Two clients have shared their stories in order to highlight what it is really like for families struggling to be together.
‘It was very, very hard’
Kate*, an Irish citizen, wanted to bring her long-term partner over to Ireland from Turkey to visit for 2 weeks. She came to Nasc after their application for a tourist visa was refused. Nasc aided Kate and her partner in appealing the refusal and this appeal was also refused. The refusal was based on an ‘obligation to return’; that is, INIS believed her partner would try to overstay his 2 week visa, even though they had shown in their application that he had a full-time job in Turkey.
After the second refusal, Kate visited her partner in Turkey and they decided to get married. Kate returned to Ireland while he was forced to remain behind and with the help of Nasc they compiled and submitted an enormous amount of documentation to support their application. Even with a 2 year relationship history, several visits to Turkey, countless telephone calls and a marriage certificate, it still took several months for the Minister for Justice to approve her husband’s application to reside in Ireland with his wife, which he finally received only 7 months ago.
Kate says about the process: “It was very, very hard. Very distressing. We were two years together before he was able to come to Ireland. And it was never certain. Just because we were married didn’t mean we would get it.” After all of the hard work and waiting, they are now living together happily in Ireland. “It was worth it for that,” Kate says.
‘What about my children?’
On the flip side, EU nationals and those who have been granted refugee status in Ireland do have a legal right to family reunification, through European and international law. This amounts to a form of reverse discrimination for Irish citizens and residents, who have no such legal rights.
Although EU nationals and refugees have clear rights to family reunification, even in those cases the process can be difficult, complex and fraught with hardship.
John* was granted refugee status in early 2012. John was born in the Democratic Republic of Congo but had fled and gained citizenship in Swaziland over 10 years ago. However he was forced to leave Swaziland in 2011 based on political persecution. His family – his wife and three of his children – remained behind in Swaziland while himself and his eldest son made the journey to Ireland. For two years, his family remained in hiding, crossing the border to Mozambique and then to South Africa to try and remain safe. His children could not attend school and his family lived in constant fear. John and his eldest son lived in a direct provision accommodation centre in County Cork. “Every time I ate breakfast,” John says, “I thought, what about my children? Do they have a breakfast to eat?”
Once John was granted refugee status, Nasc provided support for him in applying to the Minister for Justice to bring his family to Ireland. His family had to travel to South Africa to take DNA tests to prove he was their father, and the tests had to be forwarded to Ireland and then the UK for processing. Then they had to await the decision from the Minister that his family would be able to join him. Even after that decision was granted, John had no money to buy them plane tickets and relied on support from friends, family and the Red Cross to help him.
Today, his family has been here over a year and they are happy. John states, “You love your family, your wife, your children. It wasn’t easy. My first born son would ask me, ‘Papa, when is our family coming?’ and when I got to speak with them, my other children were asking ‘Papa, when are you coming for us?’ You must be strong all the way.”
For the past several years, Nasc has been providing free legal support and advocacy for Irish citizens, residents and refugees seeking to be reunited with their families from across the globe. The current legal situation in Ireland – the lack of a legal right for Irish citizens and the significant delays for others, especially refugees – means families suffer separation, fear and deprivation.
A framework facilitating family reunification for all legal residents of Ireland is desperately needed. European law on family reunification, notably the EU Directive on Family Reunification, is quite strong, and provides a model for how Irish law could look. At the bare minimum, the Department of Justice must implement a reasonable time-frame for decisions and set criteria for applications. Decisions should not rely on ministerial discretion but be dictated by clear policy.
Nasc CEO Fiona Finn states,
“Given our Constitutional protection of the family, the Minister cannot continue to turn a blind eye to the suffering caused by long delays and legislative failures. Reforms to family reunification law have been promised for years and we are still waiting. Irish citizens, residents and refugees around the world are struggling. It cannot go on.”
*Names have been changed to protect privacy.
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