Exclusion from CE schemes yet another barrier to people working while awaiting asylum decisions

Faith Kamutsungira opens a see-through plastic folder and pulls out a handful of documents. “I wanted to show you.”

She tosses the papers on the table one after another. There’s her bachelor’s degree in Development Studies. Her master’s degree in a similar field from the University of Zimbabwe.

A certificate in community development and another for finishing a women’s leadership course from Zimbabwe’s Women’s Trust.

Here in Ireland, none of that has led to a full-time job. Or, even, a community placement.

She recently heard of a work experience opportunity offered as part of the Department of Social Protection’s  Community Employment (CE) schemes from a place she was training with, she says.

“That’s when I was told, ‘No, you don’t qualify,’” she said on Saturday morning at a café in Connolly Station.

CE schemes are designed to help underprivileged people grappling to find employment, start work placements in communities and eventually break into the job market. Applicants, mostly, need to have been on particular social welfare supports for a while.

Despite their difficulties breaking into the labour market, the weekly €38.80 allowance that asylum seekers get does not count as social welfare support for the scheme. That’s one factor disqualifying them.

A spokesperson for the Department of Social Protection said that because years spent waiting on an asylum claim doesn’t count as habitual residency, that means asylum seekers aren’t entitled to regular social welfare aid.

It acknowledges the challenges that asylum seekers face while waiting for a decision on asylum claims. But “there are no current plans to change the CE eligibility criteria”, the spokesperson said.

They said it waives the condition of being on welfare aid for longer than 12 months for those who have been granted refugee status, though.

Kamutsungira says she hasn’t been called for an asylum interview yet.

Turned away

Louise Fitzpatrick, who volunteers with Inchicore for All – a local group set up to help asylum seekers settle into the neighbourhood – says she’d found a CE job suitable for one of the asylum seekers she knows.

St Michael’s Resource Centre in Inchicore had shared a job with their local group.

Fitzpatrick says the asylum seeker, who has four kids, had a ton of experience from her country of birth for the job. She was excited to apply.

“She’s doing like two or three cleaning jobs, she has been applying to any jobs that come up locally,” says Fitzpatrick.

When she was turned away, she hadn’t properly clocked why, says Fitzpatrick. “I feel like communications around this could be better.”

She’d thought it was because the asylum allowance rate was low. “I think she now feels like, ‘Oh, they don’t want me’”.

She’d explained to her that the employers would love to have her. It’s bureaucratic rules that get in the way, Fitzpatrick said.

Making the cut

In Zimbabwe, Kamutsungira was a council worker focused on helping marginalised women level up, she says.

She was in an opposition political party and outspoken too, she says. That got her in trouble. That’s why she’s seeking asylum here.

She travelled to Ireland in July 2023 and got her work permit just this April past.

Kamutsungira says she is not allowed to take on council jobs here. She runs her fingers through the sentences printed on her work permit. “I didn’t bring my glasses.”

She finally finds the line. “The holder of this permission shall not seek, nor be employed in any of the occupations listed in Schedule 6 of the European Communities (Reception Conditions) Regulations 2018,” it says.

Schedule 6 jobs include civil service and local council jobs. “At some point, there was an opening at the council, but I couldn’t apply,” she said.

Says Fitzpatrick, the volunteer with Inchicore for All: “They all have the desire for work, but there’s barrier after barrier after barrier.”

Under the Department of Justice’s fast-tracked asylum process, those from countries it considers safe effectively miss out on the right to work because it can only be granted to people who didn’t have an initial ruling on their asylum claim within six months.

Fitzpatrick knows asylum seekers who were asked to bring reference letters from Irish people to get jobs and struggled to get them, she said.

Kamutsungira says she knows interacting with Irish people and building connections is important for finding jobs.

She’d gone to church to mingle and network, but when she’d tried to hang out, people didn’t seem interested in talking to her, Kamutsungira says.

It makes her feel like people don’t want to talk to her because she’s Black, she said. “Because of my skin colour,” said Kamutsungira, touching the skin of her left hand.

She has done some healthcare training courses here, too, but employers often tell her that she needs an Irish driving licence as the job involves hopping from one client’s house to the other.

She pulls out her Zimbabwean driving licence and her Irish learner’s permit from her purse and places them on the table.

But she can’t afford driving lessons, booking fees, and, on top of all that, the cost of buying a car, she says.

“I’m not employed. How do I achieve that? This is another barrier, again,” she said.

Kamutsungira’s big passion is helping marginalised women become independent and thrive, especially sex workers, she says.

Back in Zimbabwe, she helped sex workers to build a safety net for when they get older, and it gets harder to attract clients, she says.

She was saddened and moved by their stories, she says.

How some men refused to wear protection during sex, making them ill, even giving them HIV. How police officers who are meant to protect them sometimes raped them, she said.

“They need to be trained and taught how to survive outside sex work,” says Kamutsungira.

Here, she’s grateful that a home care place has offered her a few shifts for her to shadow someone and learn recently, she says. To see how it goes.

They were nice to her, even bought her a cake to celebrate her upcoming birthday.

Kamutsungira says she almost cried. “I said, ‘Guys, you make me feel so welcome, I promise I’m going to be a loyal worker.’”