Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Bacik raised the issue of passports yesterday. I ask that we might have a further articulation of the issue in the House and I call on the Government to make time for statements on it. First-time applications for passports were taking 40 working days in 2021. We are all now dealing with cases where first-time applications are taking 12, 13, 14 weeks and more. There is a serious issue at play for people who want to travel next week and the week after and who are fearful that they just will not have their passports on time, even though they applied in good time. Can consideration be given to alleviating the pressure on the Passport Office in Dublin by, for example, putting a printing machine in place in the Cork office? There was one there before. Such a machine could be used to serve the Munster region and beyond. This is a worthwhile proposition.

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