Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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122. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade the number of applications for passports for adults to date in 2022 from counties Cavan, Monaghan, Louth and Meath; the number of such passports issued; the number of outstanding applications for adult passports currently awaiting processing in each county in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32897/22]

Michael Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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132. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade the number of applications for passports to date in 2022 from counties Cork and Kerry; the number of passports issued; and the number of outstanding applications for passports currently awaiting processing in each county in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32930/22]

Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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136. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade the number of applications for first-time passports for children to date in 2022 from counties Cavan, Monaghan, Louth and Meath; the number of such passports issued; the number of outstanding applications for children’s passports currently awaiting processing in each county in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32896/22]

Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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160. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade the number of applications for passports to date in 2022 from counties Offaly and Laois; the number of passports issued; and the number of outstanding applications for passports currently awaiting processing in each county in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32934/22]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 122, 132, 136 and 160 together.

The Passport Service is already outperforming any previous year, despite the challenges that it has encountered over the past two years.

The Passport Service continues to outperform its previous busiest year, 2019, by over 20%. Over 623,000 passports have been issued to date in 2022. This is 105,000 more passports than were issued at this point of the year in 2019. In the past four weeks, the Passport Service has issued an average of 30,000 passports per week.

99% of all child and adult online renewal applications are issued within the standard turnaround time and almost half of all adults who renew their passports online will receive their new passport in the post within 2 working days.

Processing time for first time applications now takes 25 working days, down from 40 working days in March. In the space of three months, processing time for first-time applications has been reduced by almost 40%.

My Department has been proactively planning for this significant increase in demand for many months and have made an unprecedented investment in the staffing and resources necessary to meet this demand.

A major recruitment drive, in partnership with the Public Appointments Service, has been underway since 2021. In addition, the Passport Service has run its own recruitment competition for Temporary Clerical Officers (TCOs).  The Department has also been working with the HSE to provide opportunities to contact tracing staff to transfer to the Passport Service. As of 20 June, these staff have begun to be assigned to the Customer Service Hub, which will further increase the number of staff answering customer queries. This recruitment effort will bring staffing numbers at the Passport Service to over 900 which represents double the number of staff with the Passport Service in June of last year.

The information requested by Deputy Smyth is outlined below in tabular form, for online applications. It is not possible for the Passport Service to provide the requested figures in respect of paper-based applications. The tables also break down the number of applications currently in the system that are being processed by the Passport Service, and the number that are awaiting further action by the applicant. 

Passports for adults (first time and renewals) to date in 2022:

First time passports for children to date in 2022:

The information requested by Deputy Moynihan and Deputy Cowen is outlined below in tabular form, for online applications. It is not possible for the Passport Service to provide the requested figures in respect of paper-based applications. This table also breaks down the number of applications currently in the system that are being processed by the Passport Service, and the number that are awaiting further action by the applicant.