Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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162. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade the estimated cost of hiring additional Brexit staff in his Department; the cost by grade; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [50914/17]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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Managing our response to Brexit has impacted on the work of many staff at Headquarters and a significant number of those overseas. It is important to emphasise that our approach has not been merely to recruit or assign additional staff, but rather also to prioritise Brexit in the work of our entire Department. Additional staff have been assigned to the key Divisions with responsibility for Brexit matters, the European Union Division and the Ireland, UK and Americas (IUKA) Division, to cover the issues arising from the UK exit process. For operational and service oriented units like the Passport Office and Consular service, there has been a marked increase in demand for passports and citizenship via foreign birth registration from applicants in Northern Ireland and in Britain.

Many business units of my Department at headquarters in Dublin are involved in some way as part of the response to the UK exit. For example the Legal Division, the Trade Division and the Policy Planning Unit.

Overseas, additional posts have been assigned to our Embassies in London, Berlin, and Paris as well as the Permanent Representation of Ireland to the European Union in Brussels.

To support the complex and intensive negotiation process, my Department received an additional €3.2 million as part of the 2017 allocation. The Department has also allocated an additional budget of €2 million. This budget was used to increase the number of staff assigned to the management and support of the negotiations and to increase the level of support provided to our colleagues across all Government Departments and agencies.

These measures remain under review. The Department will allocate additional staff resources as deemed necessary to further augment our level of support across Government and across our network.