Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Question 249: To ask the Minister for Justice and Law Reform the reason it was deemed that a person (details supplied) in County Kildare to have had less than the five years residency required for naturalisation given that they have lived here for more than five years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [34391/10]

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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An application for a certificate of naturalisation from the person referred to in the Deputy's Question was received in the Citizenship Division of my Department in July 2010.

The Minister has the power to grant certificates of naturalisation to applicants who comply with certain conditions under the Irish Nationality and Citizenship Act, 1956, as amended. Section 15 of the Act provides that the applicant must have been resident in the State for a period of one year immediately prior to the application and 4 years in the 8 year period before that, 60 months in total.

For the purpose of calculating this residency, no period may be taken into account where a non-national :- 1. was required to have the permission of the Minister to remain in the State but did not have that permission or 2. had permission to remain for the purpose of study (whether or not such study necessitated the employment of the non-national during the whole or part of the period of study)

On examination of the application submitted it was determined that the person in question did not have five year's reckonable residence at the date of the application as set out in the Irish Nationality and Citizenship Act, 1956, as amended. The person concerned was informed of this in a letter issued to her on 13 July, 2010.

It is open to the person in question to lodge a new application for a certificate of naturalisation with the Citizenship Division of my Department if and when they are in a position to meet the statutory requirements.

I should remind the Deputy that queries in relation to the status of individual Immigration cases may be made direct to INIS by Email using the Oireachtas Mail facility which has been specifically established for this purpose. The service enables up-to-date information on such cases to be obtained without the need to seek this information through the more administratively expensive Parliamentary Questions process.