Ms Oonagh Buckley:

I thank the Chairman and committee members for inviting the Department to address today's session. While the Department of Justice plays a supportive rather than a lead role in the matters being discussed today, we have an important contribution to make to the Government's overall response primarily through the work of our border management unit, BMU, team at Dublin Airport. The core function of the BMU is to immigrate passengers arriving into the State at Dublin Airport and to decide if a person should be allowed to enter the State and for how long. An Garda Síochána currently undertakes these immigration duties at all other ports of entry to the State.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, in addition to its core immigration duties, the BMU has performed an important role in conducting checks of health documentation. This includes digital Covid certificates, HSE vaccination certificates, NHS vaccination certificates, state-issued vaccination certificates from other third countries and negative PCR test results across all passenger cohorts in Dublin Airport. The BMU also had a significant role in the operating of the mandatory hotel quarantine system when that was in operation.

All passengers arriving into Ireland were checked for health documentation until 19 July when restrictions on non-essential international travel were eased and passenger numbers rose significantly thereafter. To avoid lengthy queues at immigration, spot checking of health documentation was implemented. In recent days, this spot-checking role has been expanded to include PCR and antigen tests in line with the latest public health advice and Government travel restrictions.

The BMU has significantly increased the level of spot-checking of arriving passengers in recent days - both at peak and non-peak times. Carriers are obliged to check each passenger's health documentation prior to boarding and there are penalties in place for passengers who arrive without the requisite documentation. It is important, therefore, that passengers familiarise themselves in advance with the up-to-date requirements. We note that the compliance rate is high and we thank the travelling public for its compliance with that. Notwithstanding that, we have seen a number of people in recent days being referred to An Garda Síochána by immigration officers for not being in possession of the required health documentation. In particular, people travelling from the UK should be aware that they are not exempt from the requirement to have a pre-departure test. Passengers can expect to see higher levels of checking as they travel through Dublin Airport in the coming days and weeks and should leave additional time for their journey both at departure and on arrival.

The BMU team works very closely with Dublin Airport Authority, DAA, colleagues, who are responsible for managing the queues on arrival to the immigration hall. Our shared objective is to ensure that queuing time is minimised and that passengers are immigrated quickly and safely on arrival while also carrying out all of our important immigration and public health functions.

A very important part of our efforts to keep a smooth flow of passengers through immigration at Dublin Airport is the operation of the e-gates. A total of over 730,000 e-gate transactions took place between August and November 2021. Approximately 30% of these transactions were unsuccessful leading to further checks by the BMU team. I am happy to answer any queries that committee members may have on the BMU role.