Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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298. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade if he will provide a schedule of the time backlog on all accepted foreign birth Irish passport applications by country (details supplied); and the additional resources he has and will provide to clear these backlogs. [55462/21]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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My Department is responsible for citizenship by descent through the Foreign Births Register under the Irish Nationality and Citizenship Act 1956, as amended.

I am pleased to inform the Deputy that as of Monday, 15th November, the processing of Foreign Birth Registration will resume on a phased basis. My Department is fully committed to allocating resources over the coming weeks to assist with the current and anticipated high volume of applications, with a focus on reducing turnaround times.

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the processing time for Foreign Births Registration (FBR) applications stood at 18 months due to an unprecedented surge in applications as a result of the Brexit referendum in the UK, and the necessary rigorous processing that applies to citizenship applications.

Due to the pandemic, Foreign Birth Registration staff were reassigned to assist in the delivery of essential services. This resulted in a pause in overall Foreign Birth Registration processing.Staff continued to provide an emergency service for Foreign Birth Registration in cases of exceptional urgency, such as expectant parents, or stateless persons. Over 5,000 of such emergency Foreign Birth Registration applications have been processed to date in 2021. For other applications, the Department operates a transparent general policy of processing Foreign Birth Registration applications in order of receipt.

At present, there are just over 31,500 applications for which documentation has been received and are awaiting processing. A breakdown of these applications by country of residence of the applicant is set out below.