Emmet Stagg (Kildare North, Labour)
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Question 52: To ask the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform if his attention has been drawn to the hardship being imposed on migrants who are granted long-term residency here arising from the recent imposition, with little notice, of a €500 fee; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [31171/09]

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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The Deputy should be aware that Ireland is virtually alone among E.U. member States in not hitherto charging a fee for long term residency status. The fee now imposed is not considered excessive and compares favourably with that charged by the U.K. immigration authorities, for example, where a fee of €950 is levied for conveying a similar status.

Long term residency is an administrative scheme operated by my Department since 2004. It enables individuals who have been legally resident in the State on the basis of work permit/work authorisation/work visa conditions to apply for the status of long term resident thus allowing them to engage in employment without the need for a work permit/work authorisation and negating the need for them to register with the Garda National Immigration Bureau on an annual basis. A long term residency permission is valid for a period of five years and on its expiry, the individual may apply to have same renewed.

The procedures involved in processing applications for long term residency are very similar to those applicable to applications for naturalisation i.e. the individual in question must be legally resident in the State for a specific period, he or she must be financially self-sufficient, be of good character, etc. The processes used to determine eligibility have been developed and refined since the scheme was introduced and, as is the case with naturalisation, are necessary to maintain the integrity of the process. Depending on the complexity of any given case, these processes can necessarily take some time to complete and involve a substantial burden on State resources. It is entirely appropriate that the State should seek to recover some of these costs. It should be noted that the fee involved does not fully meet the cost of processing the application.

The fee of €500 applies to all applicants on the initial grant of a long term residency status on or after 7 September, 2009. This status shall be valid for a period of five years at which time, the person concerned will be required to re-apply for long term residency. No fee will be payable to renew such a permission other than the existing registration fee payable to the Garda National Immigration Bureau (G.N.I.B.). Accordingly, it is worth noting that the overall cost to the applicant of long term residency, even with the fee, is less than he/she would incur by registering annually with G.N.I.B. during the currency of the long term residency permission.