Priority Area 2: Accommodation of migrants who have experienced, or are at risk of, DSGBV

Overview

It is well-documented that access to safe accommodation and independent funds are determining factors in a woman’s decision to escape DSGBV. The difficulties of fleeing DSGBV are compounded for migrant women by immigration status-related barriers. In particular, international protection applicants are not eligible to receive public funds and services normally used in providing support to victims of DSGBV, including access to: Refuge accommodation or medium- to long-term safe accommodation; Social welfare payments (e.g., One Parent Family Payment, Child Benefit); or Housing supports (e.g., Housing Assistance Payment, Rent Allowance, Rent Supplement). An international protection applicant who is a victim of DSGBV can be allocated a space in a refuge on a short-term/emergency basis but, mostly, this does not happen given the high demand for limited places from women with entitlement to public support. Generally, satisfying the different criteria of the right to reside (Habitual Residence Condition) poses a major barrier to accessing publicly-funded services and payments for victims of DSGBV without the required immigration status or who are undocumented. For example, a woman may not be able to meet the right to reside criteria if her status is dependent on an abusive husband who is the main visa holder and he withholds her visa documentation (Safe Ireland 2013, pp. 3-4). A majority of women in such situations are unlikely to leave a violent spouse or partner for fear they will “find themselves and their children destitute” (AkiDwA 2022, p. 7) or, if they do leave, usually return to the perpetrator (Safe Ireland 2013, p. 5).

Most protection applicants live in the direct provision system, which has been much criticised in the two decades of its operation. Residents reported that the “stress, poor living conditions and poverty” of living in direct provision was a contributing factor in domestic violence (AkiDwA 2010, p. 11). In addition, women have experienced sexual harassment and a hostile environment in and around some centres (AkiDwA 2012, p. 15). Despite the Government’s White Paper to End Direct Provision and to Establish a New International Protection Support Service (2021), the situation for new international protection applicants is deteriorating with the extensive use of emergency accommodation centres. The number of new applicants arriving in Ireland increased from 2,649 in 2021 to 11,500 in 2022 (Nasc 2022), along with tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees. This raises new, urgent concerns about increased risks of DSGBV, sexual exploitation and trafficking, especially for women and minor in emergency accommodation centres. It is imperative to ensure that existing safeguards relating to all forms of DSGBV in accommodation centres are implemented proactively, including the National Standards for Accommodation Offered to People in the Protection Process (DOJ 2019) (National Standards) via the International Protection Accommodation Service and the RIA [IPAS] Policy Document on Sexual & Gender-based Violence (2014).

Finally, to comply with the EU Reception Conditions Directive (RCD), in 2022, the Government introduced a questionnaire-based vulnerability assessment (VA) mechanism, to identify vulnerable persons and any associated “special reception needs” (IPAS 2022, p. 5). Under the RCD, “vulnerable” persons includes victims of trafficking or anyone who has been “subjected to torture, rape or other form of serious psychological, physical or sexual violence” (RCD, Art. 21). If the IPAS welfare team deems a person to have “high vulnerability” a social worker is assigned to “determine a specific care plan” (IPAS 2022, p. 5). Otherwise, protection applicants’ access to services is “mainstreamed” through “the same referral pathways as Irish citizens” (ibid.). The minimal nature of this approach raises questions about the adequacy of the VA mechanism to fulfil the Government’s obligations with respect to migrants who have experienced, or who are at heightened risk of, different forms of DSGBV, particularly under strained conditions in emergency accommodation.

Table 2. Accommodation: Government obligations and commitments

 Toward an improved and inclusive policy response

As a state party to the Istanbul Convention, Ireland is subject to regular review by GREVIO (the Group of Experts on Action against Violence against Women and Domestic Violence). In GREVIO reviews of other countries to date, it has emphasised “the importance of emergency accommodation being accessible to all, including migrant women” and other marginalised groups and that numerical adequacy of spaces alone is not considered sufficient to meet Istanbul Convention obligations in this area (Tusla 2022, p. 15). This demonstrates GREVIO’s expectation that each article in the Convention, including Articles 22 and 23, should must be interpreted in along with Article 4, which prohibits discrimination in the implementation of the convention on the ground of “migrant or refugee status, or other status.”

The Third National Strategy (DOJ 2022a) contains a number of potentially transformative commitments relating to meeting the needs of migrant women victims/survivors of DSGBV. Regarding the review of the 2017 Guidance for Housing Authorities in relation to assisting victims of DSGBV, this must also entail review of the implementing Housing Circular 41/2012. Both documents retain immigration status related barriers, including the HRC, which in situations where DSGBV is an issue, directly contradicts the strategy’s commitments to “enable victims/survivors of DSGBV to rapidly access and live in safe, accessible short and long term accommodation as a priority” (2.3) and to prioritise a “focus on DSGBV services being inclusive, and [improving] outcomes for socially excluded groups” (4.6). Finally, to ensure that the recommended actions of the Joint Committee on Gender Equality listed in the above table will be in line with Istanbul Convention, any provisions to address the needs of victims/survivors of DSGBV in the Housing for All Plan for Ireland (2021) or through the introduction of a new social welfare payment, must be available to all victims/survivors regardless of migration or refugee status.

Priority actions

2.1 – Set aside the Habitual Residence Condition (HRC) and other immigration status-related barriers to migrant women escaping DSGBV, to ensure inclusive access to refuges, and to medium- to long-term safe housing options and relevant public/welfare payments, regardless of immigration status.

2.2 – Expedite implementation of the White Paper to End Direct Provision, in particular, Phase One and Phase Two housing, as integral to fulfilling the National Strategy commitment to “enable victims/survivors of DSGBV to rapidly access and live in safe, accessible short and long term accommodation as a priority” (Action 2.3).

2.3 – Ensure that the DSGBV-related requirements of the National Standards for Accommodation Offered to People in the Protection Process and the RIA [IPAS] Policy Document on Sexual & Gender-based Violence are communicated to all residents and implemented in accommodation centres engaged by IPAS, including emergency accommodation.

2.4 – Ensure that all members of the IPAS Resident Welfare Team (reviewers of vulnerability assessment questionnaires and referrals), receive mandatory gender-sensitivity and cultural-sensitivity training to inform decision making.

2.5 – Require that all questionnaires or referrals that disclose experience of: “violence or trauma, such as female genital mutilation (FGM), rape … [or] domestic violence” will be categorised as requiring follow-up by the Assessment Officer and/or IPAS Social Worker to ensure appropriate accommodation and a specific care plan.

2.6 – Require that all questionnaires or referrals that disclose being “forced or tricked to come to Ireland against [their] will, for example for unpaid labour or sex work” will be categorised as requiring follow-up by the Assessment Officer and IPAS Social Worker to ensure appropriate accommodation and a specific care plan.

2.7 – Engage organisations supporting migrant women in the proposed review/s to “upgrade and strengthen” the 2017 Guidance for Housing Authorities in relation to assisting victims of domestic violence, including review and revision of the related Housing Circular 41/2012.