The Irish Short-stay Visa Waiver Programme, which commenced on 1 July, 2011 allows tourists or business people who have lawfully entered the UK, including Northern Ireland, on a valid UK visa to travel on to Ireland without the requirement to obtain an Irish visa.
Nationals of seventeen countries are currently included in the programme including India, China, Russia, various priority Middle East countries and others. As part of the initiative, nationals of these countries, who are long-term legal residents in the UK, will have the cost of an Irish visa waived should they wish to visit Ireland. It is estimated that there are up to 1 million people in this category in the UK.
The Government agreed on 28 February to the extension of the Programme for a further period of four years i.e. to end October 2016, to add Bosnia and Herzegovina to the Programme and, as a further measure to encourage tourism, to waive the fee for visas for long-term residents from the countries covered by the Programme who live in the Schengen area. This last measure will be reviewed after six months.
The Programme as it operates at present does not for technical reasons allow for reciprocity between the UK and Ireland. This is primarily due to the UK requirement that all visa applicants supply fingerprint (biometrics) data electronically as an essential element of applying for a UK visa. Quite obviously Ireland does not have the capacity to capture such data for all visa applications worldwide; currently for UK visas this is done in over 150 countries.
However, there is very close cooperation between the immigration service of my Department and the UK immigration authorities and I regularly discuss with both the UK's Home Secretary and Minister for Immigration matters relating to the operation and oversight of the Common Travel Area (CTA) arrangement. In December 2011, together with the UK's Immigration Minister, I signed an agreement which, among other things, commits both countries to developing a Common Travel Area visa. Such a visa would allow tourists and business visitors to travel to the CTA and to travel freely between Ireland and the UK. It is anticipated that such a visa will prove an attractive option for tourists and business visitors and it is intended to conduct a trial scheme which will be used to gauge likely demand and to resolve the substantial practical issues around its introduction. The availability of a visa for the Common Travel Area would, of course, supersede the existing Waiver Programme.