Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 23 October 2012
116. Deputy Jack Wall asked the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade the reasons a child (details supplied) in County Kildare has not received an Irish passport; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [45637/12]
View answerThe Passports Act, 2008 provides, among other things, that only Irish citizens are entitled to be issued with Irish passports. Each application received by the Passport Service must, therefore, demonstrate that person’s entitlement to Irish citizenship before a passport can issue. As the applicant was born in Dublin on 7 May, 2009, his entitlement to Irish citizenship is subject to section 6A of the Irish Nationality and Citizenship Act, 1956, as amended (the Act). This provides that a person, born in the State on or after 1 January 2005, where neither parent is an Irish or British citizen or otherwise entitled to reside in the State or Northern Ireland without restriction at the time of that person’s birth, may claim citizenship by birth in the State (and thereby establish eligibility for an Irish passport) only where a parent has been lawfully resident in the State for three of the four years immediately preceding that person’s birth.
In line with guidelines provided by Department of Justice and Equality, which is the Department responsible for immigration and citizenship, the proofs of lawful residence, which are accepted and considered by this Department for passport applications, are immigration stamps in passports and/or the registration cards/books. These are issued to persons registering their lawful presence in the State with the Garda National Immigration Bureau (GNIB). These are official documents/permits, which can be objectively verified by the Passport Service, if required.
The child’s father is a non-EU national and the mother a Romanian and therefore EU citizen. The proofs above would therefore be required for all of the father’s residence and for any of the mother’s residence prior to Romania’s entry into the EU on 1 January, 2007. After this date, the mother’s residence is subject to section 6B(2) of the Act, which makes particular provision for parents from EU Member States whereby such nationals may make a declaration (Form A) in a prescribed form concerning their residence in the island of Ireland within the four years immediately preceding the birth of their children. This declaration must be supported by the submission of the parent’s EU passport and by documentary evidence of that parent’s lawful residence in Ireland. That parent will then be regarded as having resided in the island of Ireland for the declared periods for the purposes of section 6A of the Act, unless the contrary is proved.
Two applications were made on behalf of the person in question by his parents – the first in October, 2010 and the second in August, 2011. On both occasions the submitted evidence of the parent’s lawful residence in the State in the four year period immediately preceding their son’s date of birth (i.e. 7 May, 2005 to 6 May, 2009) was examined. Neither parent had the required amount of reckonable residence to demonstrate their child’s entitlement to Irish citizenship. Accordingly, these applications could not be approved for passport issue under the Passports Act, 2008 on the grounds that the child is not an Irish citizen.
