State pays over €1.9 million to cover costs at Wicklow IPAS centre
The Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth which handles international protection accommodation service (IPAS) centres, has released figures detailing the amount of money the state has paid out so far this year to run these facilities in County Wicklow.
The data for Q1 2025 shows Vesta Hotels Limited received the biggest allocation in February with two payments of €680,680, and a third worth €607,750 to provide accommodation for international protection applicants.
A Hiqa report carried out at the south Wicklow facility in 2024 recorded capacity of 111 people.
At the time of inspection, it was accommodating 104 residents, and nine of these were children.
Meanwhile Arturo Ventures Unlimited received a payment of over €320,000 in January to provide accommodation for Ukrainians in west Wicklow.
However, with a reduction in demand for accommodation for Ukrainians, elected members of the Baltinglass Municipal District have been told the operator of the Avon Hotel in Blessington has instead been offered to provide accommodation for international protection applicants.
At their meeting in May councillors were informed this would be offered under a lease agreement of up to two years which is currently being examined by the Department.
The 95 Ukrainian residents currently being accommodated at The Avon are all due to be relocated by August 8.
The proposal to turn the hotel into an IPAS centre has sparked opposition from residents in recent weeks, with protests taking place in the town.
They claim department officials have failed to consult them about their plans and fear the move could have a negative impact on local services.
ADVERTISEMENT
The figures also show Powertique Limited received two separate payments from the state in January totalling more than €1 million to house Ukrainians at the Royal Hotel in Bray.
Meanwhile Woodstone Property Ak Limited which oversees operations at the Wilton Hotel in Bray received over €203,000 in January to accommodate Ukrainians seeking international protection.
A breakdown of the figures also shows E and B Hotel Limited which owns Rathmore Country House in Ashford was allocated over €65,000 in January for the associated costs in providing accommodation.
As of May 2025, there are currently 1,395 international protection applicants residing in County Wicklow.
This figure far exceeds that of its neighbouring counties, including Wexford (605), Carlow (436) and Kildare (564) but naturally the numbers in Dublin are much higher. There are currently 3,403 applicants for international protection based in centres in Dublin city, with 1,190 in Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Journal
37 minutes ago
- The Journal
'Massive' Russian attack on Kyiv kills at least five people
UKRAINE HAS SAID that 'another massive attack' on the capital Kyiv has killed at least five people, a day after the country's top military commander vowed to intensify strikes on Russia. Diplomatic efforts to end the three-year war have stalled, with the last direct meeting between the two sides almost three weeks ago and no follow-up talks scheduled. AFP journalists in Kyiv heard the buzzing of a drone flying over the city centre and explosions, as well as gunfire. 'Another massive attack on the capital. Possibly, several waves of enemy drones,' said a statement from Tymur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv's military administration. Four people were killed in Shevchenkivsky district, where part of a residential high-rise building was destroyed, and another person was killed to the south in Bila Tserkva, said Interior Minister Igor Klymenko. AFP journalists saw around 10 people sheltering in the basement of a residential building in the centre of the capital waiting for the attack to end, most of them scrolling their phones for news. Medical workers help a woman in a yard of an apartment building destroyed after a Russian attack. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo The latest strikes came after Ukrainian commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrsky vowed to intensify strikes on Russia . Advertisement 'We will not just sit in defence because this brings nothing and eventually leads to the fact that we still retreat, lose people and territories,' he told reporters, including AFP. Syrsky said Ukraine would continue its strikes on Russian military targets, which he said had proved 'effective'. 'Of course we will continue. We will increase the scale and depth,' he said. 'Fair response' Ukraine has launched retaliatory strikes on Russia throughout the war, targeting energy and military infrastructure sometimes hundreds of kilometres from the front line. Kyiv says the strikes are a fair response to deadly Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure and civilians. At least four people were killed in an overnight Russian strike on an apartment building in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, while a strike on a Ukrainian army training ground later in the day killed three others, officials said. In wide-ranging remarks, Syrsky conceded that Russia had some advantages in drone warfare, particularly in making fibre-optic drones that are tethered and difficult to jam. A destroyed car is seen as firefighters work on the site of the damaged building. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo 'Here, unfortunately, they have an advantage in both the number and range of their use,' he said. He also claimed that Ukraine still held 90 square kilometres of territory in Russia's Kursk region, where Kyiv launched an audacious cross-border incursion last August. Related Reads Ukraine army chief vows to expand strikes on Russia US condemn Russian strike on Kyiv that killed an American among at least 13 others 'These are our pre-emptive actions in response to a possible enemy offensive,' he said. Russia said in April that it had gained full control of the Kursk region and denies that Kyiv has a presence there. Russia occupies around a fifth of Ukraine and claims to have annexed four Ukrainian regions as its own since launching its invasion in 2022 – in addition to Crimea, which it captured in 2014. Kyiv has accused Moscow of deliberately sabotaging a peace deal to prolong its full-scale offensive on the country and to seize more territory. The Russian army said Sunday that it had captured the village of Petrivske in Ukraine's northeast Kharkiv region. Russian forces also sent at least 47 drones and fired three missiles towards Ukraine between late Saturday and early Sunday, the Ukrainian air force said. © AFP 2025 Want to know more about what's happening in Ukraine and why? Check out our new FactCheck Knowledge Bank for essential reads and guides to finding good information online. Visit Knowledge Bank
Irish Independent
2 hours ago
- Irish Independent
Airlines weigh Middle East cancellations and deal with ‘location spoofing' after US strikes in Iran
The usually busy airspace stretching from Iran and Iraq to the Mediterranean has been largely empty of commercial air traffic for 10 days since Israel began strikes on Iran on June 13, as airlines divert, cancel and delay flights through the region due to airspace closures and safety concerns. New cancellations of some flights by international carriers in recent days to usually resilient aviation hubs like Dubai, the world's busiest international airport, and Qatar's Doha, show how aviation industry concerns about the region have escalated. However, some international airlines were resuming services on Monday. Leading Asian carrier Singapore Airlines, which described the situation as "fluid", was set to resume flying to Dubai on Monday after cancelling its Sunday flight from Singapore. Similarly, Flightradar24 departure boards show British Airways was set to resume Dubai and Doha flights on Monday after cancelling routes to and from those airports on Sunday. Air France KLM cancelled flights to and from Dubai and Riyadh on Sunday and Monday. With Russian and Ukrainian airspace also closed to most airlines due to years of war, the Middle East had become a more important route for flights between Europe and Asia. Amid missile and air strikes during the past 10 days, airlines have routed north via the Caspian Sea or south via Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Added to increased fuel and crew costs from these long detours and cancellations, carriers also face a potential hike in jet fuel costs as oil prices rise following the US attacks. Proliferating conflict zones are an increasing operational burden on airlines, as aerial attacks raise worries about accidental or deliberate shoot-downs of commercial air traffic. Location spoofing and GPS interference around political hotspots, where ground-based GPS systems broadcast incorrect positions which can send commercial airliners off course, are also a growing issue for commercial aviation. Flightradar24 told Reuters it had seen a "dramatic increase" in jamming and spoofing in recent days over the Persian Gulf. SkAI, a Swiss company that runs a GPS disruption map, late on Sunday said it had observed more than 150 aircraft spoofed in 24 hours there. Safe Airspace, a website run by OPSGROUP, a membership-based organisation that shares flight risk information, noted on Sunday that US attacks on Iran's nuclear sites could heighten the threat to American operators in the region. This could raise additional airspace risks in Gulf states like Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, it said. In the days before the US strikes, American Airlines suspended flights to Qatar, and United Airlines and Air Canada did the same with flights to Dubai. They have yet to resume. While international airlines are shying away from the region, local carriers in Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq are tentatively resuming some flights after widespread cancellations. Israel is ramping up flights to help people return home, and leave. The country's Airports Authority says that so-called rescue flights to the country would expand on Monday with 24 a day, although each flight would be limited to 50 passengers. From Monday, Israeli airlines will start to operate outbound flights from Israel, the authority said. Israeli airline El Al on Sunday said it had received applications to leave the country from about 25,000 people in about a day.
Irish Independent
4 hours ago
- Irish Independent
State pays over €1.9 million to cover costs at Wicklow IPAS centre
The Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth which handles international protection accommodation service (IPAS) centres, has released figures detailing the amount of money the state has paid out so far this year to run these facilities in County Wicklow. The data for Q1 2025 shows Vesta Hotels Limited received the biggest allocation in February with two payments of €680,680, and a third worth €607,750 to provide accommodation for international protection applicants. A Hiqa report carried out at the south Wicklow facility in 2024 recorded capacity of 111 people. At the time of inspection, it was accommodating 104 residents, and nine of these were children. Meanwhile Arturo Ventures Unlimited received a payment of over €320,000 in January to provide accommodation for Ukrainians in west Wicklow. However, with a reduction in demand for accommodation for Ukrainians, elected members of the Baltinglass Municipal District have been told the operator of the Avon Hotel in Blessington has instead been offered to provide accommodation for international protection applicants. At their meeting in May councillors were informed this would be offered under a lease agreement of up to two years which is currently being examined by the Department. The 95 Ukrainian residents currently being accommodated at The Avon are all due to be relocated by August 8. The proposal to turn the hotel into an IPAS centre has sparked opposition from residents in recent weeks, with protests taking place in the town. They claim department officials have failed to consult them about their plans and fear the move could have a negative impact on local services. ADVERTISEMENT The figures also show Powertique Limited received two separate payments from the state in January totalling more than €1 million to house Ukrainians at the Royal Hotel in Bray. Meanwhile Woodstone Property Ak Limited which oversees operations at the Wilton Hotel in Bray received over €203,000 in January to accommodate Ukrainians seeking international protection. A breakdown of the figures also shows E and B Hotel Limited which owns Rathmore Country House in Ashford was allocated over €65,000 in January for the associated costs in providing accommodation. As of May 2025, there are currently 1,395 international protection applicants residing in County Wicklow. This figure far exceeds that of its neighbouring counties, including Wexford (605), Carlow (436) and Kildare (564) but naturally the numbers in Dublin are much higher. There are currently 3,403 applicants for international protection based in centres in Dublin city, with 1,190 in Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown.
