Terry Leyden (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I ask the Leader to request the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Deputy Coveney, to come to the House as soon as possible to explain the extraordinarily long delays in obtaining passports. It really has got out of control and it sometimes takes up to 35 days to either obtain or renew a passport. It is causing major distress in families, particularly if they are outside the Dublin urban area. Most public representatives are talking about this. It is practically impossible to get through to the Passport Office by phone. On Thursday I got through after 25 minutes and after giving information about a really distressed young lady who wants to go on holidays, I was told by a staff member that under data protection regulations, the case could not be discussed with me. This is totally untrue. We were advised by a senior legal firm in Dublin - the parliamentary party had a seminar this morning - that under section 40(3) of the Data Protection Act 2018, public representatives such as Senators, Deputies and councillors are entitled to discuss a case with any State office. Somebody needs to tell somebody somewhere that this is happening.

I rang the Minister's office yesterday and told him about this and I was told it had never heard the story before. It is a concern because if we are dealing with Brexit but cannot sort out the Passport Office in Ireland, where are we going? We know there is a rush on. Applications are coming in for joint passports from Northern Ireland or Britain and there should be a priority system to take this into account as most of those people have passports anyway. Such applications for a joint passport could be done during a lull. Representatives of the Passport Office will appear before the Committee of Public Accounts tomorrow and our colleague, Deputy Fleming, made that request. I hope they will give good answers to the questions put to them by public representatives.

Data protection regulations are being used and abused by the public service to prevent us as Senators, as well as Deputies and councillors, getting information regarding constituents. We are legally entitled to discuss a case with any public official because constituents have instructed us to act on their behalf. We should be clear about that. I ask the Leader to tell the Government to get the house in order. The Tánaiste, Deputy Coveney, should get the instruction to the Passport Office to answer the telephone and inform the staff accordingly. They should be able to tell us the passport will be available for collection or posting.