Waterways Ireland Is On Grand Canal Patrol To Prevent Tents

Waterways Ireland has started a Grand Canal patrol for 24 hours in Dublin. The patrol is to ensure that homeless asylum seekers do not put up tents and stop them from encampments along the canal banks.

Waterways Ireland is an Irish organisation that is responsible for navigating, restoring and promoting the waterways all across the country. The sites are developed for public enjoyment for which the firm has more than 350 staff and team members for managing the waterways according to the Irish infrastructure standards.

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Its recent ‘pilot program’ is determined to remove the fences along the canal banks that have been there since May. For the said purpose, two security personnel have been deployed for Grand Canal patrol in the Portobello area initiated on Tuesday.

The volunteers working with the Waterways Ireland team, wearing red jackets, told that the staff has asked several asylum seekers to deter their tenting and leave Dublin. The orders were launched on Wednesday during the security patrol.

A statement was posted on Waterways Ireland on its website that explained that the Grand Canal patrol was in place to “deter erection of illegal encampments” and “to deter criminal damage to Waterways Ireland property and fencing”.

The statement further clarified that if any illegal encampment is detected, despite giving orders and warnings, it would be reported to An Garda Síochána.

The firm is also concerned about the well-being of the people staying in the tent along the canal. They met with the local authority representatives to discuss the specific concerns and how they can be dealt with.

For reopening the amenity of the canal, a number of options need contemplation. The pilot program is initiated for this aim and that is why, the acceleration of landscaping and exploration of biodiversity program is in the works.

Steps for Waterways Ireland’s pilot program

Several steps have been mentioned by Waterways Ireland that are encompassed within its Canal patrol and pertinent pilot program. The steps include:

Enhanced monitoring with two personnel, who have already been delegated for a 24-hour patrol to prevent settlements on bank
Considering health and safety concerns for those residing in the camps
Any health or other issue detected would be reported to Gardai instantly.
The pattern of erecting tents and noticing how many were intact in how much time would be observed by the firm’s staff
New tent campers would be discouraged from erecting any new tents along the canal in the light of public health concerns as a collaboration from the local authorities.

Although new patrols were launched to prevent further camping attempts, previous attempts were also made, shortly after which, tenting was reinstated. Some of the tents were destroyed by protestors in mid-July and some were forced out by an anti-camp fencing campaign in May.

Moreover, several multiagency camp clearances were active in the first half of this year and were successful in removing male asylum seekers.

Various complaints were reported due to these campings. More than 90 came from May till mid-August. The complaints were lodged directly to Waterways Ireland.

Other authorities have a new meaning to tenting on the canal. One such phenomenon came from the Take Back Our Spaces Coalition which protested that these fences should be classified as “exclusionary, racist and classist”. They were of the view that the tents were used as a weapon for the immigration issue and had targets to “divide the working class communities”.

The fencing problem escalated when the International Protection Accommodation Service stopped providing shelter to single, adult, and male asylum seekers on December 4.

Waterways Ireland concluded from the patrol that 2,588 male asylum seekers are waiting on the canal banks for their shelters. These figures were corroborated by the data of the Department of Integration.