Michael D Higgins (Galway West, Labour)
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Question 482: To ask the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the number visas held by domestic workers employed in the private homes of foreign diplomats here (details supplied); the conditions attached to such visas; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15043/10]

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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The status of diplomatic and other staff of foreign missions, including private domestic workers or private servants employed by diplomats, is regulated by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations which, under the Diplomatic Relations and Immunities Act 1967, has the force of law in the State. The Convention provides that the sending state must notify the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, or such other ministry as may be agreed, in the receiving state of the arrival and departure of diplomatic staff, their family members and private servants and the engagement and discharge of persons resident in the receiving state as members of the mission or private servants entitled to privileges and immunities.

Persons who are in the State as private domestic workers for foreign diplomats are given an endorsement in their passport by the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service which acknowledges their status in the State. They are not required to be issued with a separate GNIB registration card and accordingly they would not be recorded in the register of foreign nationals from which statistics are extracted. Therefore the statistical information sought by the Deputy is not available.

The person concerned enjoys certain exemptions in respect of taxes and dues in the course of their employment, so long as they are not nationals of or permanently resident in the receiving State.