Passport Services
Dail Éireann — 2026-10-01
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Cathy Bennett (SF), Cavan-Monaghan

I welcome the work the Passport Office does. I believe it is very efficient. I see many people getting their passports within a week of applying. I believe it is a fantastic service and does operate very well. I encourage people to apply online because it is the fastest process, whereas the paper process can be much slower.
What I would like to say today concerns the checks. I brought this issue up when I met the Passport Office in the audiovisual room one day. The Passport Office seems to have a system where it checks the photographs and the birth certificates as the application proceeds through the process, instead of checking everything in one instance. I have had complaints come into my office where people have had to wait six months because, on the first check of a passport, the pictures were not correct and they had to resend the pictures. The application then went back to the checker again but then the next issue arose, instead of all the issues arising during the first check by the Passport Office. I have requested before, and I request it again, that checkers request everything in the first instance instead of people posting documents back and forth and incurring postage costs as well. I thank the Minister.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-10-01/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:01:00+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-10-01