I’ve got no problem with immigrants and I’ll happily say that to everyone I meet.
Colman Reidy – Editor In Chief
Coming of age in Dublin in the 2000s, things looked a lot different to how they look now.
The Silicon Docks were just a twinkle in Bertie Ahern’s eye. The city was beset with shady nightclubs but bereft of well-found commercial property. There were almost no multinational SaaS firms which today form the cornerstone of Dublin’s famous ‘Thirsty Thursday’ pub culture. Anglo-Irish Bank ruled the roost and deals were smashed in Lansdowne Road, long before it was ever called ‘The Aviva’. 😉
But the biggest, and perhaps most striking change, is the people. Simply put, 30 years ago following the death of Phil Lynott in 1986, everyone in Ireland was White.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that was a good thing. Not at all. I celebrate people of all creeds, but the life-blood of this publication is to speak plainly around the facts.
Immigration to Ireland has been a massive blessing. Immigrants staff our HSE and bring new life to our communities. I have no problem with someone from the other bits of the world coming here in search of a better life.
And let’s not paint a clichéd photo here either, immigrants come from all over to work in Meta, Amazon and the birthplace of my career KPMG. These highly skilled workers pay high levels of income tax, which makes up 32.5% of the €108 billion we raked in last year.
But there is a sinister cloud to this silver-lining.
Able-bodied people wasting away in direct provision for decades, Brazilians who’ve come to ‘study English’ on cash-in-hand kitchen arrangements for 10+ years, ominous tent cities appearing along our canals. A rising tide lifts all boats, but Ireland’s rising tide has revealed dangerous barnacles clinging to the Ship of the State.
Now, that’s just an opinion but what does the data say?
You may hear that 7/10 of abusers in Ireland are known to their victims and that there is no significant evidence that migrants posed any more of a danger than native-born citizens. However, the presence of migrants builds fear in communities leading to asylum centres being burnt down and vicious resentment, so that when migrant crime does occur it sparks waves of incendiary protest and looting. Using higher-order thinking you could therefore say that migrants are the cause of increased crime.
However, data isn’t always the full picture. As TikTok mega-star Garren Noone put it in his latest viral post, people feel less safe, people feel as though the system is being abused. And oftentimes, isn’t that what’s more important?
Some say that the 18,000 asylum applications processed in 2024 puts increased pressure on an already optimised housing market. According to the 2022 census, there is anywhere from 102,000 to 164,000 vacant and derelict properties across the country that could be brought into use. But, should housing supply increase; Ireland simply becomes a more attractive target for low skill, low value-added labour. Quite frankly, expensive housing keeps Ireland sharp, competitive and among the elite.
So, what is to be done?
Clearly, we have 2 types of immigration into Ireland: the first kind and the other kind.
The first kind is smart people with important jobs and nice clothes. These people need to be attracted to Ireland with high salaries, up-market dining experiences and adventurous but friendly first-date experiences. These are the innovators, the integrators, who provide vital economic outcrossing to our labour market. They can afford high rents, they bring property prices up and with it raise the standards of the whole country.
The other kind (and this isn’t pretty but someone has to commission a publication to say it) are the meek, the downtrodden, the ones who arrive not with a slim laptop carrier but with needs. They come seeking support to elevate themselves out of poverty rather than offering synergy with a highly financialised, service-based economy. Of course we should provide for these people, but only in so much as they can provide value to us. It is not with regards to our benevolence that they should expect their dinner, but with regards to our own self interest.
This is the heart of Ireland immigration debate. More must be done to appease the frothing hordes of McGregor supporters to prevent them from burning down their own public services, more must be done to screen migrants, to conduct a thorough cost-benefit analysis upon application. Imagine a system of direct provision, but rather the provision was to the state instead of vice versa. Perhaps a short period of ‘internmentship’, if you will.
Let me end by saying this: Liberalism runs through my veins. Of which the free movement of people is a core principle. Even if immigration puts pressure on our housing system, if the native-born Irish can’t compete for rent, then they can pack up, move to Australia and stop returning their father’s calls. That’s the name of the game in a free world.
A Quiet Word 