If immigration was not on the political agenda in 1998, it did not take long to become so afterwards. Indeed, soon after the agreement, the already rising strength of the Irish economy reversed the historic pattern of emigration to one of immigration, a reversal which in turn resulted in a large number of foreign nationals claiming a right to remain in the state based on their Irish-born citizen children. They did so on the basis of a 1989 Supreme Court judgment in "Fajujonu v. Minister for Justice" where the court prohibited the deportation of the foreign parents of an Irish citizen. In January 2003, the Supreme Court distinguished the earlier decision and ruled that it was constitutional for the Government to deport the parents of children who were Irish citizens. This latter decision would have been thought to put the matter to rest but concerns remained about the propriety of the (albeit indirect) deportation of Irish citizens and what was perceived as the overly generous provisions of Irish nationality law.