Niall Ó Donnghaile (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Well, you never know. Is there any such thing? I wish Senator Clonan well agus go n-éirí go geal leis.

First, I wish to note the remarks of the Minister of State with responsibility for overseas development aid and the diaspora published in the Irish Independenttoday. It might surprise people that I read the Irish Independent, but there you go. The Minister of State said the Government will commit to holding the referendum on presidential election voting rights before 2024. While I welcome the assertion, I would like to think it will happen before 2024, given it is a programme for Government commitment. What we need, and what I would like, is for the Minister of State, Deputy Brophy, or the Minister for Foreign Affairs, who has lead responsibility for taking this legislation through the Houses, to come before us after the Easter recess and outline the timeframe involved in the legislation. We cannot wait any longer. We cannot keep travelling the world on St. Patrick's Day and lauding our global diaspora, telling them how important they are. We cannot commit to telling citizens in the North they will no longer be left behind and then, when we have the opportunity to do something tangible that would assert and affirm their citizenship, not actually do it. It is commendable the Government is committed to this. It has been committed to it and has made announcements around it for a very long time. What we need now is for the definitive timeline to be laid before us and, if necessary, to initiate the legislation in this House. I am sure we would be happy to help it along the way.

I want to finish by raising the following. A few weeks ago, our colleagues in Fine Gael brought a very commendable motion before us in relation to the Passport Office, which I supported. It outlined a number of asks of Government. In March 2022, more than 100,000 applications were made to the Passport Office. In February 2022, in excess of 150,000 applications were made to the office. The month prior to that, more than 137,000 applications were made. There is a huge backlog. It seems to me all the Department has done up until now is to tell people to check earlier before they book holidays. I am sure it is the same across the Chamber, but there are people contacting me who applied for passports, particularly for young children, in November 2021 that are still being tracked. The Deputy Leader is aware of that herself. That is the reality. This is now becoming a supply and demand issue. When people apply for a passport, they pay a fee. It is not a nominal fee. It is a fairly significant amount of money. That is going in. It is time the Government invested. The staff are doing a fantastic job. They can only operate in the confines in which they find themselves. We need greater investment and greater service delivery. Only the Government can deliver that. I encourage colleagues in government, and I say it sincerely, to keep at their colleagues on this issue, if they have not done so already. It needs to be sorted.