Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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We want the widest possible range of services to be made available at the Cork passport office so that people who need a passport in an emergency do not have to travel halfway across the country and back to get one. People must be able to get a passport in the Cork passport office as a matter of course. Has the Department reviewed this matter? What options are available to enable the maximum level of service to be provided to people living in the south?

John Halligan (Waterford, Independent)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 44 and 47 together.

The Passport Service, located in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, is one unified service composed of three constituent offices located in Lower Mount Street, Dublin, Balbriggan, County Dublin, and South Mall, Cork. The Passport Service operates three passport printing machines, two of which are located in the main production facility in Balbriggan, County Dublin, with the third located in the passport office in Mount Street, Dublin.

Passport applications from citizens residing in Ireland and throughout the world are distributed for processing across the three passport offices. All passport applications are processed through the centralised automated Passport Service system. All production facilities can print a passport irrespective of the channel through which the application was processed. This printing system allows for flexibility between printing machines if any one machine has reached capacity. Each passport printer has a printing capacity of 250 passports per hour. The purchase cost of a new passport printing machine alone is in excess of €1.7 million. This does not include the cost of security, maintenance, technical fit-out, staffing and rental costs, which would bring the total cost to well above €1.7 million.

The production processes and administrative arrangements within the Passport Service are kept under constant review. The three current printing machines are meeting the Passport Service printing demands and have additional capacity. I am satisfied that the printing capacity of production equipment currently employed by the Passport Service is sufficient to meet current and anticipated future demand for passports. There are no plans at this time to commission any additional passport production equipment or sites.

Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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Is it not the case that the Cork office is the only passport office that does not have a printing facility? Cork and the entire southern region are being placed at a disadvantage. The number of people travelling through Cork Airport has increased from 2.1 million in 2015 to 2.4 million people in 2018. People travelling to and from locations outside the UK accounted for the bulk of this growth and these people need passports.

People from the region want to be able to travel from there through the airports in Shannon and Cork. In the event that they ,have an emergency, they are forced to go to Dublin to get an emergency passport, turn around and come back or not travel from Cork Airport. If we want to have balanced regional development should we not be supporting the regions? That is laid out in the various programmes for Government. Would it not be more suitable for people in the south of the country to be able to get emergency and normal services in their local passport office, which is up and running in Cork? Has there ever been a review of the various options and if not, why?

John Halligan (Waterford, Independent)
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Some extra staff and resources have been given to the Cork region. The passport service received sanction this year for 236 temporary clerical officers to be appointed to the passport offices in Dublin and Cork in accordance with the requirements of each office. Of these temporary clerical officers, 30 were sanctioned for the Cork passport office. In addition, 13 clerical officers have joined the Cork passport office's permanent staff since the beginning of the year. An assessment was carried out by the Cork office and it requested these staff. An additional 43 staff have been employed by that office. The indications are that the cost of a machine would be astronomical, €1.7 million. This would not include staff, security, maintenance, technical fit out of the machine and rental costs. That is why an assessment was made in Cork and Dublin.

Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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In the context of balanced regional development, having counterweights to Dublin in places such as Waterford, Shannon, Cork and Limerick gives them an opportunity to grow. It does not all have to go through Dublin. A passport office is up and running in Cork. The Minister of State mentioned an assessment of staffing and processing applications. I am talking about printing facilities, making the full service available in the south so that people from Waterford, Cork, Kerry, Clare and across the entire southern region would be able to get that service locally and there would be a more balanced regional approach to it. Has an assessment ever been conducted of having printing outside Dublin in the Cork office? The Minister of State started the credit card printing facility in recent years, surely at that stage some assessment would have been conducted on where it should be done. If that has not happened, can there be a review so that we can see if it would be viable for people in Cork and in the south of the country to have the full service available to them?

John Halligan (Waterford, Independent)
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There was an assessment of the requirements of the offices in Dublin and Cork. The office in Cork required 43 more staff, 30 temporary officers and 13 clerical officers, and it received them. Each passport printer has a capacity of approximately 250 passports per hour. The printing requirements of the office in Cork are met, according to the office in Cork, by the machines in Balbriggan and Mount Street, without any difficulty. If that is the case, the Deputy would be asking us to invest well over €1.7 million for a new machine for the Cork office that we probably would not need. We assessed the requirements of both offices and this is what they asked for and got.

Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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People in the south would prefer to travel out of Shannon or Cork airports, and we want to see the development of the Port of Cork. In the event of an emergency passport being needed, however, the Minister of State is saying they will have to travel all the way to Dublin, get their emergency passport and come back, doubling their journey. In normal circumstances, people want to have a service in their own area. There is already a passport office in Cork. The Minister of State is from the regions. He understands the idea of having local services and balanced regional development. Surely this sends out a strong statement to people in the regions that they can have the full service and that they are not in the second position.

John Halligan (Waterford, Independent)
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We have been assured by the passport offices in Mount Street, Dublin, and South Mall, Cork, that they can facilitate the issuing of emergency travel documents where there is an urgent need to travel, particularly for medical reasons or due to a bereavement abroad where the strict criteria for the issuing of such documents have been met. To repeat, we are basing the answers to these questions on the assessment made by speaking to the three passport offices, Balbriggan, Mount Street and South Mall about their requirements. They specifically stated they required 43 additional staff and they got them. We are told by the three offices that the facility to print passports is sufficient as it is today.