Global Ireland – Ireland’s Diaspora Strategy 2020-2025
News
30 November 2020
The Government of Ireland has approved a new Diaspora Strategy for the period 2020-2025. The Strategy sets out what the Government will do over the next five years to support and engage with our diaspora communities around the world. It takes a broad and inclusive definition of the diaspora, reflecting the diversity of the global Irish community today. The Strategy also reflects the priorities in the Programme for Government, in particular, the commitments:
• to ensure that the most vulnerable of our overseas communities are supported;
• to hold a referendum to extend the right to vote in Presidential elections to Irish citizens, wherever they live;
• to seek pathways to legal migration to the US and solutions for undocumented Irish citizens;
• to promote opportunities by the next generation of the Diaspora to work and study in Ireland;
• to address barriers facing emigrants who are returning home.
Welcoming the publication of the new Strategy, the Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister), Micheál Martin, T.D., said “I am very pleased to launch Ireland’s new strategy for the Diaspora, central to which is a deep appreciation of the profound importance of connection. For many, the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic has placed a renewed emphasis on their relationship and links to Ireland.
“There are around 70 million people around the world who are Irish-born or of Irish descent and this Strategy celebrates these people, and all who have a special affinity with Ireland. It cherishes their diversity, champions our connections with each other and seeks to give our diaspora a strengthened voice within Irish life, while also setting out the many ways this Government will work to support the Irish abroad.”
To read the Diaspora Strategy, please click here Global Irish section of the DFA website.