Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I acknowledge the detail in the Minister's answer. I also acknowledge that the staff of the Passport Office are working hard and that they were moved to other Departments as part of the pandemic response, which I accept.

The Minister mentioned in his response that there was regular contact with passport applicants but there was not. Applicants come to us because they cannot get the information on where their passport will be and they cannot get through to the Passport Office. The online checker that shows people the passport application’s progress was not being updated at the height of the summer. That is why applicants come to us. We need extra customer services staff who can actually show people where their application is.

On the first-time applications, I agree 100% with the Minister on the need for checking those, in particular for infant passports. However, I have a case going back to June that has everything in place but we cannot get information on it.

In the coming months and next year, there will be an awful lot of people planning to travel because they have not been able to travel in two years. They will do the usual thing; they will go to travel and there will be no passport. We need the Department to be proactive, to buy space-----

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