"Most modern states reserve certain rights to their citizens and reserve rights for the control of citizens." Introducing an immigration Bill that was criticised for its provisions on deportation, ministerial discretion and new powers of detention and arrest, those were the words with which Eamon de Valera put the last comprehensive piece of immigration reform before the Oireachtas more than 70 years ago.
Echoes of the Aliens Act 1935 end there, however, and a new unified code to overhaul the anachronisms of the earlier law - enacted when there were thought to be no more than a few thousand foreign nationals living in Ireland - has been a long time coming.
Insofar as it modernises and consolidates the disparate aspects of immigration and asylum law, the Immigration, Residence and Protection Bill, published this week by the Minister for Justice, is to be welcomed. The introduction of a single procedure for people seeking protection could do much to alleviate delays in the system, while the granting of a reflection and recovery period to suspected victims of trafficking will bring Ireland into line with minimum European standards. The creation of a new long-term residence status is also a promising shift.
However, there are serious shortcomings. The Minister is right to say that enforceable rules are essential to maintaining confidence in the immigration system. But they must be fair. Provisions for summary deportations and detention, as well as more restricted access to judicial reviews of asylum refusals, must not set an unreasonably high bar for victims of persecution whom the State is obliged to protect. The Bill tightens the rules around undocumented workers, but there is no respite for those who lose their papers for reasons beyond their control.
More generally, the Bill raises questions about policy direction. Immigration and integration policies are mutually dependent. But there is a sense in which the emphasis on security and stringency has pushed aside the important long-term measures that will be required to achieve social integration. The Aliens Act of 1935 was a close reflection of restrictive measures taken by the British government due to fears of Jewish immigration. Seventy years on, it appears that central aspects of the new Bill are also inspired by the harsher measures introduced in several European countries - including the UK, Denmark and the Netherlands - where politicians are contending with a backlash on immigration.
But it would be instructive to pay more attention to countries whose experience has been closer to Ireland's. In Sweden, Spain, Belgium and Portugal - all of which have seen immigration rates rise from low bases with economic gain and broad public acceptance - law and policy are concerned more with giving newcomers the tools for integration, with improving the efficiency of migration procedures, and with making clear what newcomers can expect of the State. It would be a strange irony if Ireland's approach to immigration were to mimic that of countries whose experiences it is eager not to repeat.