The Government’s reforms to the asylum process will mean the rights of applicants will be “stripped away”, an immigration lawyer has warned. 

Today at Cabinet, Justice Minister Jim O’Callaghan briefed his colleagues on the content of the International Protection Bill 2025.

On Newstalk Breakfast, Cathal Malone of Thomas Coughlan & Co Solicitors said Ireland is obliged to modify the asylum process after deciding to sign up to new EU rules. 

“He is just bringing forward legislation which is going to implement the EU Migration and Asylum Pact,” he said. 

“Which is an agreement between all of the EU countries on how they’re going to deal with asylum and refugee matters going forward into the future. 

“[Minister O’Callaghan] has got very little to do with it; these are consequential amendments that we have to make in order to bring us in line with what all of Europe’s going to be doing from June 2026.” 

Tents erected along Dublin’s Grand Canal. Image: Barry Whyte/Newstalk

The pact is designed to streamline the application process for those applying for asylum and for all applicants to have a decision within three months.

However, for certain applicants, the aim is to give them an answer even faster than that. 

It is also understood there will be a significant restrictions to the right of applicants to have their appeal orally - which the Government hopes will speed up the process.

“If you’re from a ‘safe country’, so-called by the Department, if you’re from a country with a lower than 20% grant rate of asylum applications across Europe and most importantly if you show up without the correct documents in Ireland or any other country in Europe - in any of those cases, you’re in the border procedure,” Mr Malone said. 

“This is the 12-weeks to get a decision, possibility of detention - essentially a lot of your rights are stripped away. 

“But what listeners have to remember is, almost everybody shows up with the correct documents because you can’t apply for a visa to come to Ireland to claim for asylum.” 

Opposition

Irish Refugee Council CEO Nick Henderson said he and his colleagues were “really concerned” about the reform. 

“The Irish Refugee Council and many other charities in Ireland and Europe oppose the pact,” Nick Henderson said. 

“We believe it’s an erosion of asylum rights, the shift towards deterrence and externalisation.”

Main image: Jim O'Callaghan. Picture by: Niall Carson/PA Wire/PA Images