Man arrested as scuffles break out at asylum seeker hotel

A man has been arrested after scuffles broke out at a hotel in Co Tipperary as protesters gathered while asylum seekers were being taken on to the premises.

Demonstrators have gathered outside the Racket Hall Hotel in Roscrea since Thursday, after news broke that the hotel was to be used to house asylum seekers.

Gardai and members of the Garda public order unit formed a cordon at the entrance to the hotel while the international protection applicants were bussed to the hotel.

The hotel is to provide accommodation for around 160 applicants as the state struggles to house refugees.

There were stand-offs between demonstrators and gardai, and video footage posted online showed scuffles breaking out.

It is understood that around 60 people took part in the protest.

Protesters, some holding placards saying “Irish Government are traitors” and “asylum money racket”, remained at the hotel.

People have been bringing the demonstrators food and supplies with the protest set to continue.

A spokesman for the protest, Justin Phelan, told the PA news agency that the protest had been outside the hotel “peacefully” since Thursday and there was “no politics” involved.

He said that about 15 or 16 men, women and children were housed in the hotel on Monday.

“The problem here is we live in a town which is badly served by government, badly served by politicians. We don’t have a TD,” he said, adding that GPs and schools are at capacity and public transport is poor.

“This is more to do with the hotel, and the consequences of it being closed is going to have, than it is to do with who may or may not occupy the hotel.

“There’s 20 or 25 young boys and girls under the age of 20/21 who use this work to pay for their college, pay for their car, pay for whatever.

“Quite simply, this little town and community is already struggling with what we have, and we can’t handle any more.”

Asked about the clashes with gardai, he said: “There was maybe 20 uniformed gardai here, we had spoken with them, we were drinking tea with them, there was no problem.

“All of a shock, 20 guys in riot gear appeared and made a burst for the gate, so we made a burst for the gate on the inside and we kind of made a wall. They made a wall. Half a minute later, or maybe a minute later, 20 or 30 more of them appeared.”

He said that in the scuffles people were injured and knocked to the ground.

“It’s just bonkers and the thing about it is, if the guards had approached somebody and said ‘guys, there’s children on this bus, we’re going to take them off, we’re going to walk them into the hotel’, we would have stood back and allowed the children into the hotel, no problem. But they didn’t do that.

“They made a burst for us to push us out of the way, and then they tried to bring children in behind. The children got caught up in that mess not because we wanted to scream and shout at children, that wasn’t the case at all.

“We have children, they’re only children, we don’t have a gripe with them children gone in that door, that’s not the point. The point is the guards went about it the wrong way.”

Uniformed gardai remain at the hotel.

Gardai said: “Shortly before 12 midday, uniformed members of An Garda Siochana, supported by ‘soft cap’ public order personnel provided a cordon at the entrance to the IPAS Centre to facilitate access for transport carrying international protection applicants.”

One man was arrested under the Public Order Act and has since been released. A file will be prepared for the Office of the Director of Public Prosecution.

Gardai said “soft cap” means the public order personnel were not wearing helmets or body armour.

They added that pepper spray was not used during the operation, contrary to suggestions.

The hotel is one of several buildings earmarked for housing asylum seekers that have been targeted in recent months.