In the Republic of Ireland, on the day new Taoiseach Leo Varadkar took office, what does he do – he goes and endorses the system called Direct Provision by increasing the weekly allowance by €6.00 for children and €2.50 for adults, making the allowance €21.60 for everyone. We reject this increase in the strongest possible terms. We really feel insulted by the newly elected Taoiseach, who seems to have no understanding whatsoever about what we have gone through in direct provision for 17 years. The Taoiseach said that these offensively miniscule increases would give asylum seekers more disposable income – if our situation wasn’t so serious this would be a joke. We were not consulted on this, no one asked us what we needed. We are furious that people think that 2.50 or 6 euro will do anything to address the damage caused to our lives by Direct Provision.

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