Neale Richmond
Question:1318. Deputy Neale Richmond asked the Minister for Justice the efforts that are being made to streamline and speed-up the immigration system; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [2218/22]
View answerWednesday, 19 January 2022
Questions (1318)
Written answers
The Covid-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on my Department's immigration service delivery. In line with public health advice, my Department has implemented a suite of measures to help reduce the spread of the virus. This has unavoidably led to a reduction in processing capacity across many business areas. However, it is important to say that applications have continued to be accepted and decisions issued at all times during the pandemic.
My Justice Plan 2021 commits to developing a fully digital, customer-centric immigration service and to enhance the efficiency of our immigration system. In line with these commitments, a number of actions have been taken to reduce the impact on immigration processing times, including the introduction of online applications, a new customer service helpdesk and a new customer-focused immigration website.
As a result of the introduction of the temporary statutory declaration process in January 2021, and the additional staff assigned to the citizenship team, last year, 11,512 citizenship decisions were delivered, significantly exceeding the levels achieved in the last two years.
Since 1 January 2022, new applicants for citizenship no longer have to submit their original passport with their application. Instead, they can provide a full colour copy of their entire passport, including the front and back covers. This is also freeing up valuable staff that up to now have been engaged in returning passports to applicants and will also help to reduce processing times.
A number of digitisation measures have also been introduced to increase efficiency in the process, including eTax clearance, eVetting and online payments. The end result of the digitisation process will be to free up more staff to focus on processing applications in a timely and efficient manner, to improve service to our customers and reduce waiting times to between 6-9 months for a majority of applications during 2022.
My Department's Registration Office has also had to reduce the number of in person appointments that can be offered by 50% because of public health restrictions. The Public Office has unfortunately been closed during the highest level of public health restrictions, for the safety of our customers and staff. To mitigate these closures and restricted services, nine temporary extension of immigration permissions have been provided for the benefit of our customers, the most recent to 31 May 2022.
To help meet the existing demand for first-time registration appointments in the Dublin region, my Department introduced a new Freephone telephone booking system on 10 January 2022, to ensure those who need an appointment can access one. In the first four days of operation, over 1,700 customers have received appointments booked through this Freephone service. A new online booking system will also be launched early in 2022, which will improve appointment delivery direct to our customers.
My Department and in particular staff of our frontline immigration services are doing all that we can to continue to provide a quality service to our customers during this unprecedented period. The situation will continue to be monitored, in the weeks and months ahead in order to maintain and further improve on service delivery to our customers.