Cost of Ukrainian refugees: value is all that matters

The truly enormous financial support provided to Ukrainians who fled to Kerry following tyrant Vladimir Putin’s murderous invasion of their country four-and-a-half years ago is exclusively revealed this week in this newspaper.

Considering the entire suite of emergency assistance made available in Kerry to the refugees, including rooms in hotels and other kinds of accommodation, there can be little surprise that the total cost is upwards of €242m.

Property owners, particularly hoteliers, provided urgent accommodation when called upon to do so and were entitled to be compensated for that.

Some of them have been paid significant amounts of money by the State, but these payments should only be considered on the basis of value for money and NOT as to whether or not the payments should have been made in the first place.

What happened to Ukraine, and what is still happening to Ukraine, is outrageous. Dictator Putin decided to destroy his next-door neighbour and impose his will on about 41 million people.

This merciless assault means the country will never be the same again. It’s estimated that about nine million people, well over one-and-a-half times the population of Ireland (excluding the North), fled Ukraine.

Due to the capture by Putin of about 20% of Ukraine, the high number of deaths as a result of the war and the number of refugees who simply haven’t yet returned home (millions will never do so), it is estimated that even by the year 2040 the Ukrainian population will only be about 35 million.

People in Ireland have a natural affinity with Ukrainians, perhaps because of a shared history of unspeakable suffering, including avoidable famines.

This explains why we Irish opened our arms and our hearts to the 120,000 or so Ukrainians who chose Ireland as their refuge after Putin launched his ‘special military operation’. Now around 84,000 Ukrainians remain in Ireland, many fully employed as their children attend schools.

There is an obvious sensitivity on the part of the State about revealing details of the costs of refugee accommodation. But, the public have a right to know the depth and width of the financial contribution made to supporting Ukrainians.

Kerry’s Eye Chief Reporter Aidan O’Connor was required to carry out major, time-consuming research to uncover some of the details for this week’s exclusive story. Such painstaking effort should not be necessary in a free and open system of public administration.

The State has nothing to fear from full disclosure, given that the money had to be paid if our words of support from Ukrainian refugees were to mean anything.

As stated earlier, the only thing worth thinking about in respect of accommodation for Ukrainian refugees is whether the deals done with providers gave value, individually and overall. After that the providers deserved payment, and fair play to them.

The matter of value for money, however, needs further examination.