Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the visitors for their presentations.

There has been a considerable improvement in the administration of passports over the past number of years. I note the demand is greater and it is where a member of the public finds himself or herself in an emergency that we must plan for to a greater extent that we have.

Occasionally, a constituent, when everything else is ready for the holiday, will seek assistance with a lost or out-of-date passport for their youngest child and will be asked why they did not think of that beforehand. That is not the issue. The issue is that it is not there now. That is how we must try to look at how to deal with it. Generally speaking, it has been possible to do a certain amount. There may be a case, as Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan mentioned, where it could be done better. That is not a criticism of the staff. It is a criticism of the system.

A couple of years ago, I had a situation where somebody arrived in this country to attend a funeral and their passport went out of date when they were here. They did not have time to do anything when they arrived. They had an Irish passport but they live in the United Kingdom. We tried everything and failed to get them a passport. They travelled over on the ferry and got the passport in the embassy in the United Kingdom in time for their flight which could not have been done otherwise. My point is it should be possible to unravel the wires to such an extent that it would be possible to meet the person's requirements. We did all that needed to be done in the case of an emergency and bereavement, and it did not happen. The system has improved since then and that is to be acknowledged.

Another matter I wanted to mention quickly is that of children's passports. This relates in most cases to immigrants or non-nationals. There are a quite a number of cases where the child has a passport and the parents do not and the determination of the parents' eligibility for naturalisation is still pending where the passports have been withdrawn. The grounds on which the passports are withdrawn are that the parent at the time of issue of the child's passport did not have an entitlement to residency in the State. The problem is that this causes confusion. The passport is already in place and it is there. I do not know why this still happens. There have been quite a number of such cases. I am not objecting to the granting of the passport to the children. The parents may have been here for ten years and for various reasons, they have not been naturalised. Ten years is a long time and one may have three or four children in that period. A number of the children in a family could have an Irish passport and the others not. That is the part that causes the problem for the parent, both from the point of view both of identification and from the point of view of travelling to see their grandparents, parents or whatever the case may be.

My last question is one I have raised previously. In a diplomatic passport, for some unknown reason the description of profession in all other cases is correct. If one is a Senator, it is clear enough, "Seanadóir". I am not sure whether they call one a Senator or Seanadóir in the English version. My point is that English, French and Irish are the three languages covered. In the Irish version, it states "Teachta Dála" or "Seanadóir". In the French version, it states the correct version, "Member of Parliament", "Senator", whatever the case may be. In the English version, as far as I can recall, it states "Teachta Dála" for a Deputy and, as far as I can recall, "Seanadóir" for a Senator - it is a while since I was in the Seanad. It certainly states, "Teachta Dála". I cannot understand how the English version should be, "Teachta Dála". It should be, "Member of Parliament", because the French version states, "Member of Parliament" - that is the translation. Either it is in French or it is not.