Willie Penrose (Longford-Westmeath, Labour)
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485. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade about the remedy available to a person (details supplied) in County Westmeath who has legally changed name by way of deed poll, who has changed all legal documents to reflect this and who now wishes to travel under the new name but where the Passport Office has refused for at least two years to issue a new passport to reflect the new identity, which effectively compels the person to travel using an old passport notwithstanding that the person has sworn on affidavit not to do so, and which will have consequences if the person becomes ill in the country visited; if in this context, he will permit the new passport to be issued in the new name; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42725/15]

Charles Flanagan (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)
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All passport applications are subject to the terms of the Passports Act, 2008, as amended (the Act). This provides a legal basis for the various policies and practices which are applied by the Passport Service in the processing of passport applications. Section 10 of the Act provides that a passport will issue in the name of a citizen as it appears on his/her birth certificate. However, a name change for a passport from that which appears on a person’s birth certificate is permitted under the Act in situations such as marriage for example.

In cases where name change arises, other than by marriage, civil partnership, adoption or gender change, the Act specifically requires evidence of the use of this new name over a two year period. While there is discretion under the Act in accepting evidence of usage for less than two years, this has been normally applied in the past to serious cases such as those involving domestic abuse.

While the person in question may have changed her name by deed poll, this is not, of itself, evidence of a change of name. To determine a person’s name at any given moment in time depends upon evidence to support the constant and sustained use of this new identity. A deed poll merely sets out an intention to change a person’s name and does not, by itself, have the effect of changing that person's name. A deed poll is, therefore, not conclusive evidence of a change of name.

There is no record on the system of a passport application refusal to this person in her new name. It should, therefore, be noted that her current passport is a travel identity document that is issued under the provisions of the Act and which is accepted at all international border points. As indicated, it may be replaced with her new name if relevant evidence of the usage of that name is available to her. If this is the case, she should make a passport application in the new identity well in advance of any future travel that she may have planned. If not, she should plan her travel and insurance cover on the basis of the identity in her current passport.