Emergency passport service crackdown

The Government has cracked down on the issuing of emergency passports for children, following a rise in attempted abductions and in a bid to combat fraud.

The Department of Foreign Affairs is also conducting a review of its out-of-hours emergency passport service because of “budgetary pressures”.

Lost, stolen, or out-of-date passports were previously issued to minors irrespective of the purpose of travel. The strict new protocols mean a passport can only be issued to a minor out-of-hours where the duty officer is satisfied that the proposed journey is related to the death, serious injury, or illness abroad of a close relative, or a medical emergency relating to the applicant themselves.

Labour TD Ciarán Lynch said he only discovered the new arrangements when he contacted the Cork passport office on a Friday evening on behalf of a constituent and his family who discovered at the last minute their child’s passport was out of date. The new protocols prevented the issuing of an emergency passport for the minor until after the weekend.

The constituent and the child had to delay their travel plans for five days, while the rest of the family jetted off on holidays.

Mr Lynch raised the issue with Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs Eamon Gilmore, who replied in the Dáil this week.

The minister’s department provides a duty officer service outside normal office hours to deal with urgent matters, including the issue of passports in situations of genuine urgency or emergencies.

He said the nature of this service was under review “in the context of budgetary pressures and the review of allowances being conducted by the department of public expenditure and reform”.

He also said there had been some necessary changes to the rules covering the issuing of passports out-of-hours in recent months. “Stricter measures have been put in place to combat passport fraud and to prevent children being taken from the State without authorisation.

“If parental authorisation is secured, an emergency passport may be issued to a minor out-of-hours where the duty officer is satisfied that the proposed journey is related to the death or serious injury or illness abroad of a close relative or a medical emergency relating to the applicant themselves.”

Mr Lynch said the department had obviously had to introduce tighter new controls for good reason.

“But I would urge urged parents and guardians who are planning to travel abroad over the coming weeks and months to check the date of their children’s passports because the old emergency passport facilities are no longer available,” he said.

The Department of Foreign Affairs said duty officers can only issue a temporary passport out-of-hours to adults, provided the applicant has shown a previous passport.

Passports cannot be issued to first-time applicants and children, or those who are reporting their passport lost or stolen, except in exceptional circumstances such as emergency medical treatment.