Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)

That happens to anyone who arrives into a port. The Deputy raised issues with the passport system. We all want to speed up the passport system as much as possible so that people can get their passports quickly. The Deputy then raised the issue of people who seek citizenship through naturalisation. I had the great privilege of being down in Killarney on Monday when a judge was handing out citizenship. I was there to celebrate the citizenship of new Irish citizens. The Deputy would be surprised at the number of people there who have been in Ireland for years. I hope Mr. David Evans, also known as the Edge, does not mind me mentioning him but he has some public prominence and he was one of the people who received Irish citizenship. Like everyone in this House, I had assumed he was an Irish citizen but in fact he came to Ireland from Wales with his parents when he was one year of age. The Deputy should know that there is a very vigorous system in the Department of justice for the purposes of assessing citizenship applications. By way of example, most of the people I met down in Killarney have been in this country for many years.

The Deputy also raised issues regarding people claiming international protection having arrived without documentation and the affidavits they subsequently swear. I will provide some statistics in respect of the excellent work being done by the border management unit within my Department. This unit is doing doorstep operations at Dublin Airport on a much more consistent basis. In 2024, the border management unit carried out 7,325 doorstep operations at Dublin Airport. By the end of May this year, it had already carried out 2,453 such operations. The border management unit is doing a significant amount of work.

If a person comes in claiming international protection, that person is entitled to have his or her application considered and processed. It is the same in every EU country and in the UK. What I am trying to do is to speed up that process, so people are not staying in Ireland for a number of years while waiting for their applications to be finalised and determined. It is much fairer to those people and to the system if they are given prompt decisions. If we get prompt decisions - I am seeking to have decisions made within a period of three months in the first instance and on appeal - we will not have the type of situation the Deputy is concerned about. Where people have been granted international protection, they are perfectly entitled to stay and may subsequently apply for citizenship. If they have not been granted international protection, they will not be entitled to stay. That is the way the system is dealing with the matter. It is a complicated issue but vigilance is at a high level in the Departments of justice and foreign affairs.

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