Written answers

Wednesday, 26 May 2010

Department of Foreign Affairs

Departmental Staff

10:30 am

Photo of Billy TimminsBilly Timmins (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Question 206: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs the number of civil servants in his Department who received coaching in a foreign language in the past 12 months; the expenditure that his Department incurred in providing such coaching; the languages in which such coaching was provided; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [22175/10]

Photo of Micheál MartinMicheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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In the past 12 months 233 officers of the Department have received coaching in a foreign language. Total expenditure on language training for officers of the Department in 2009 and to-date in 2010 was €272,111. Language training was provided in the following languages: Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Farsi, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Spanish, Swedish, Tetum and Turkish.

Photo of Billy TimminsBilly Timmins (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Question 207: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs the training his Department's staff received in the past 12 months in providing support and assistance to the families of Irish victims of disasters and personal tragedies abroad; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [22179/10]

Photo of Micheál MartinMicheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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My Department arranges training for staff who are involved in providing consular support and assistance to Irish citizens abroad and their families in Ireland. Consular staff at HQ are provided with detailed instructions on how to deal with the range of consular cases that arise. As the Deputy will be aware, when a crisis occurs involving a substantial number of Irish citizens abroad, we activate the Consular Crisis Centre which is staffed for the duration of the crisis by officers drawn from other Sections of the Department. These volunteer staff are provided with regular refresher training on how to respond to such crises.

Staff in our Missions abroad are on the frontline when consular issues occur. Annually, as part of the Department's training programme for officers being posted abroad, we provide specific training focusing on the full range of consular issues that they may face. Consular assistance and crisis management issues were also covered in the pre-posting Management Development training course in 2009. In addition, specialised training is provided for the Diplomatic Duty Officers taking over the "out of hours duty officer service" dealing with emergency consular cases involving Irish citizens abroad.

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