Marc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for reading out the reply. I appreciate that she is here, but the reply is an insult. We got a bunch of statistics. The passport service has 900 staff, has received €10 million in extra funding and it is going to be the devil and all. I expect the other Deputies in the Chamber and you, a Cheann Comhairle, would agree that the lived experience of passport processing in this country is that we have gone into reverse, at warp speed.

The helpline for Deputies is not fit for purpose. I will give an example. The Minister of State, Deputy Niall Collins, will be annoyed that I am putting this on the record but I am going to do so. He rang the Deputies' helpline on a Tuesday and said he was a Minister and had someone who needed a passport by the Friday to attend a funeral in New York on the Saturday. He was told there was not a hope. He was laughed at. He dutifully went back and told the person seeking the passport he was sorry but he could not make it happen. The Minister of State was told he was useless and the person said he would go to someone else to get this done. The Minister of State told the person he was welcome to do so but that, in his view, the person would not succeed. On the following Friday, the man in question rang the Minister of State from an airport departure lounge and told him he was useless as he had collected his passport at Iveagh House the previous night. That is unacceptable, but it is consistent with the way elected Members of this Oireachtas are being treated. It is consistent because we are merely to be tolerated while Robert Watt and Co run the whole show.

See this speech in context