Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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1288. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality if her Department will consider organising more frequent swearing-in ceremonies to speed up the naturalisation process or if she will authorise a simpler form of swearing-in process. [29050/22]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I can advise the Deputy that such matters are kept under constant review.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Ireland was the first European country to host an e-citizenship ceremony in July 2020. Following a review of this pilot event, the confirmation of the applicant identity and the celebratory aspects of the ceremony were decoupled.

As a result, the affidavit process that I introduced as a temporary measure has afforded over 15,000 applicants the opportunity to receive their citizenship certificates since January 2021.

The upcoming, in-person citizenship ceremony, scheduled for 20 June 2022, is the first since the pandemic. It will see both the applicant identity and the celebratory aspects combined into an integrated process - which is operationally more efficient. For example, prior to the pandemic, when applicants were invited to an in-person ceremony over 95% attended, whereas when an affidavit request issues approximately 75% of cases are concluded. As a result, my Department currently has a significant number of applications on hand where the processing of the application by the Department has been completed, but have not been concluded.

That said, I am very mindful of the need to balance the number of citizenship ceremonies and the operational efficiency of the entire process.

Planning for additional ceremonies in December 2022 is currently underway, and these plans will be informed by the June ceremony.