Press Release: Nasc are delighted to announce our four-part seminar series ‘Exploring the Day Report’
Nasc, the Migrant and Refugee Rights Centre are delighted to announce our four-part seminar series ‘Exploring the Day Report’. The seminar series co-hosted by University College Dublin Sutherland School of Law, begins on the 17th November at 12.00 with reflections on the Day Report from report author Dr Catherine Day and Advisory Group members Fiona Finn, (Nasc CEO) and Bulelani Mfaco (Movement of Asylum Seekers in Ireland). The first seminar will be chaired Dr Liam Thornton.
In October 2020, the Day Report on supports for persons seeking international protection in Ireland was issued. The Day Report recommended significant changes to the processing of international protection applications, including introducing legal obligations on the State for fair and timely decision making. The Day Report explicitly advised that the system of direct provision be abolished and replaced with a tiered set of supports to persons in the international protection system.
The Day Report has been broadly welcomed by activists, residents, civil society organisations and academics.
Beginning three weeks after the long-awaited publication of the Day Report, these webinars offer an opportunity to take a deeper look at the ground-breaking recommendations contained in the Report and how these might be implemented in the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth White Paper to be published in December 2020.
The first webinar will offer a discussion of why and how the Advisory Group came to these recommendations as well as the next steps forward.
Fiona Finn, Nasc CEO: “We’re delighted to be co-hosting this seminar series with Dr Liam Thornton and UCD Sutherland School of Law. We are now at a really critical moment, where for the first time in twenty years there’s a real possibility of ending direct provision and transforming our international protection process. The publication of the White Paper is the next step in setting out a detailed plan to implement the report recommendations by mid-2023. It is incumbent on us all to what we can to ensure that the Day Report is allowed to bring about meaningful change and does not become a byword for a missed opportunity. We owe it to the people in our international protection process to ensure that this is the last such report needed on ending direct provision.”
Dr Liam Thornton says: "The Day Advisory Group report provides yet more evidence of the wholly unsuitable nature of the system of direct provision. The time has now come for the public, politicians and government to finally commit and deliver upon the need to end the system of direct provision and ensure protection claims are determined fairly and efficiently. The roadmap presented by the Report provides an extraordinarily clear human rights rationale for the need to end direct provision. The seminar series will permit a deeper evaluation of the Day Advisory Report, and inform a wider audience on the need to ensure that the Report is implemented in full and without delay."
Catherine Day says: "Our report sets out clear recommendations for a more humane and more cost effective permanent system for handling applications for international protection. Ireland can and must do better to live up to our EU and international obligations. We hope that the work of the Advisory Group will feed into the White Paper to be published by the end of the year and that our recommendations will be the basis for a new system which will help to integrate those granted protection to build new lives in Ireland".
Bulelani Mfaco says: “The Irish government has an opportunity to do things differently. To treat asylum seekers more humanely. And the Catherine Day Group Report shows us that there are workable alternatives to the abhorrent system of Direct Provision.”
ENDS.
Media contact:
Fiona Hurley
Policy and Communications Manager | Nasc, Migrant and Refugee Rights Centre
Ph: 087 104 3284
Email: [email protected]
Note for editors:
Nasc is the Irish word for ‘link’. Nasc, the Migrant and Refugee Rights Centre is a non-Governmental organisation based in Cork City. Nasc works with migrants and refugees to advocate and lead for change within Ireland’s immigration and protection systems, to ensure fairness, access to justice and the protection of human rights. Our goal is to realise the rights of all migrants and refugees within Irish society.
More information on the ‘Exploring Day’ webinar series is available at www.nascireland.org/exploringday