Withdrawal of the State from the Migration and Asylum Pact of the European Union Bill 2026: First Stage
Dail Éireann — 2026-09-23
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Paul Lawless (AON), Mayo

It is an honour to introduce this Bill before the House to remove Ireland from the EU migration pact to restore Irish sovereignty over its borders. The decision to opt into the EU migration pact by this Government or the previous Government was reckless. The idea that the Government is unable to determine the future cost in terms of fines is incredible. Ireland has unique challenges in sharing a border with a non-EU country. It is extraordinary that this has never been addressed in relation to this pact. When the EU migration pact passed in the Dáil, it did so by a narrow majority. By my calculation, 59 of the TDs who voted that day are no longer TDs. They either retired or lost their seats. Newly elected TDs like myself have never had the opportunity to have our say in relation to the EU migration pact. The Irish people have never had a say either. We are the ones who are mandated by the sovereign people of Ireland. The previous Government seeded sovereignty in relation to our borders even though the Government is unable to tell us through parliamentary questions how much it will cost us in terms of fines. That is why we in Aontú are tabling this Bill to try to reverse that decision and return decisions over migration and our borders to the democratically elected Dáil.
As Deputy Tóibín mentioned, Poland was given exemptions in relation to the migration pact. Those exemptions were necessary because of the extreme pressures that Poland was and is experiencing in relation to Ukrainian refugees. However, Ireland is experiencing very acute challenges as well, such as the fact that 23% of the population of this country are foreign born, that we have such an immense housing crisis and that the services in terms of education and health are at capacity. These are factors that should be accounted for. I refer the EU migration pact-----

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-09-23/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-28T05:50:49+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-09-23