Mark Wall (Kildare South, Labour)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

27. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport if he is seeking to update the application procedure for applying for a parking disability permit, if he will address some specific issues (details supplied). [24634/25]

Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

As Minister of State for International & Road Transport, Logistics, Rail & Ports, I wish to advise that

a disabled parking permit cannot be issued unless the photo verification section on the initial application has been signed and stamped by a member of An Garda Síochána.  This is standard practice for verifying the photograph as genuinely being that of the person described on the form. The rise in permit fraud has meant that the bodies responsible for issuing the permit, the Disabled Drivers Association of Ireland and the Irish Wheelchair Association, have to be strict in ensuring verification of photographs. 

While the issuing bodies and the Department appreciate that the verification requirement may be a source of inconvenience to some applicants, this procedure is an essential tool in combatting fraud, which reduces the availability of accessible parking bays in general and undermines access for legitimate permit holders, for whom to these parking bays is essential.

The decision to run a postal-based application system is an operational matter for the joint issuing bodies and my Department has no function in this regard.