Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I wish to raise an issue that has become of concern to people around the country, mainly British people but also other foreign nationals who have been living in this country for a considerable period of time. When applying for citizenship, the law stipulates that they need at least one year's continuous residence. In the case of a constituent of mine, Stephanie McCorkell from Ashbourne who has lived in Ashbourne for 40 years, it turn outs that a new rule has been brought in which is not in the law or in any statutory instrument that a break of six weeks breaks the link completely.

There are retired people who may go for a camping holiday for six weeks in the summer or go to visit friends or relations in other countries and who are not breaking their continuous residence in the place where they live. My constituent has been denied citizenship because she was absent from the country for a six-week period last year. A straight and plain reading of the law makes it clear that the Department of Justice and Equality is not entitled to deny her and others citizenship on this basis. An article in The Irish Timesover the weekend indicates that clearly there are other cases because many immigration solicitors have raised the issue. Some of them have contacted me after I tabled a parliamentary question on this case a number of weeks ago. Has the Minister changed the law without coming through the Oireachtas?

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