While marriage to an Irish national by a non EU national does not grant any automatic right to reside in the State, if a non EU national spouse of an Irish national was already legally resident in the State prior to the marriage, then he or she can make a request to the local Registration Officer for a change of their immigration status to reflect their marriage to that Irish national.
If, however, the non EU national has no legal status or is an asylum seeker in the State at the time of the marriage, he or she may make an application to the Spouse of Irish National Unit, Immigration Services Section, Irish Naturalisation & Immigration Service, 13/14 Burgh Quay, Dublin 2 seeking permission to reside in the State on that basis. I am informed by the Immigration Services Section of the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service that applications of this type are currently taking 6 — 7 months to process. The processing time for dealing with such applications can vary depending on the particular circumstances of each individual case and the nature of the investigation required. This processing time meets our current expectations and in fact in the High Court Case of K M & D G -v- The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform (2007 No. 321 J.R.) Justice John Edwards held that a period of between 9 and 12 months was reasonable for the making of such decisions.
At the end of June 2009 there were 122 applications on hand. In all instances processing arrangements are kept under ongoing review and steps are taken to ensure that applications are dealt with as quickly as possible having regard to overall resources across the full range of services provided by the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service. The following table outlines the figures for the past 12 months in respect of applications processed by the Marriage to Irish National Unit.
Month
|
Received
|
Approved
|
Refused
|
July 2008
|
28
|
19
|
0
|
August 2008
|
15
|
40
|
8
|
September 2008
|
31
|
50
|
9
|
October 2008
|
49
|
50
|
9
|
November 2008
|
24
|
31
|
12
|
December 2008
|
31
|
28
|
1
|
January 2009
|
24
|
42
|
9
|
February 2009
|
38
|
38
|
1
|
March 2009
|
47
|
70
|
1
|
April 2009
|
32
|
38
|
5
|
May 2009
|
44
|
28
|
4
|
June 2009
|
37
|
43
|
7
|
Overall
|
400
|
477
|
66
|