Jim O\u2019Callaghan<\/a> will bring the International Protection Bill 2026 to Cabinet on Tuesday morning.<\/p>\nIt comes ahead of the introduction of the EU Migration and Asylum Pact across the bloc from June.<\/p>\n
It is expected that the bill will put a new long-term framework in place to manage migration and asylum. This would ensure that policies implemented by the Irish Government are in line with its European colleagues.<\/p>\n
It was suggested that the \u201cobjective\u201d of the legislation being brought to Cabinet by Mr O\u2019Callaghan is to provide \u201cfair, sustainable, and efficient asylum procedure that is consistent with how asylum laws operate across the EU\u201d.<\/p>\n
As part of the legislation, it is envisaged asylum claims will be processed more quickly due to the introduction of a \u201cmore efficient decision-making system\u201d.<\/p>\n
It is also hoped the legislation will reduce the cost of assessing asylum applications, as faster processing times will reduce the length of time a person will spend in State-provided accommodation.<\/p>\n
It will also lead to successful applicants being granted asylum sooner, as well as returning those with unsuccessful applications to their country of origin more promptly.<\/p>\n
Senior Government sources stated that the legislation being brought to Cabinet by Mr O\u2019Callaghan will \u201clead to the most significant reform of Irish asylum laws in the history of the State, in line with the EU Migration and Asylum Pact\u201d.<\/p>\n
Last April, Mr O\u2019Callaghan got Cabinet approval for the drafting of the International Protection Bill 2025.<\/p>\n
This outlined time limits for how quickly different international protection applications would be assessed.<\/p>\n
It suggested that standard applications would take six months, while applications being assessed under the \u201caccelerated\u201d procedure would be looked at within three months.<\/p>\n
A three-month decision deadline would also apply if a person seeking asylum had no documents, posed a security risk, or was from a country where approvals were less than 20%.<\/p>\n
The legislation discussed by the Cabinet last year also planned to limit the use of oral hearings for asylum seekers who are appealing decisions.<\/p>\n
A pilot project was conducted by the department of justice within the International Protection Office and the International Protection Appeals Tribunal last year to assess whether Ireland could fulfil the EU processing obligations that will be introduced under the EU Migration Pact.<\/p>\n
Over 300 decisions were handed down to people from Georgia, Brazil, and India within 12 weeks. Mr O\u2019Callaghan told the D\u00e1il in November that within 12 weeks, applicants went through the first stage and appeals stage of the asylum process. Deportation orders were also signed \u201cin many instances\u201d.<\/p>\n
The EU Migration Pact will come into effect across member states from June and will tighten immigration rules across the bloc.<\/p>\n
It aims to improve burden-sharing of asylum applications across the EU, due to some member states receiving a disproportionate number of asylum seekers.<\/p>\n
In 2025, 13,162 people sought asylum in Ireland. This was down from 18,651 in 2024, a decrease of 29%.<\/p>\n
Of the applications received in 2025, 2,2021 (15.4%) were made by people from Somalia. Some 1,940 (14.7%) came from Nigeria, 1,680 (14.7%) from Pakistan, 1,292 (9.8%) from Afghanistan, and 925 (7%) from Georgia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cabinet ministers will discuss the \u201cmost significant reform of Irish asylum laws in the history of the State\u201d…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":240733,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,1629,60,43],"class_list":["post-240732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-immigration","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=240732"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240732\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/240733"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=240732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=240732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=240732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}