886. Deputy Matt Carthy asked the Minister for Justice, Home Affairs and Migration the number of citizenship applications refused on good-character grounds in each year from 2016 to date; the number therein arising from criminal convictions, pending criminal proceedings, Garda investigations, tax matters, immigration offences, fraud, national-security concerns or other grounds, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [65009/26]

909. Deputy Matt Carthy asked the Minister for Justice, Home Affairs and Migration the number of persons granted Irish citizenship by naturalisation in each of the years 2016 to 2025 and to date in 2026 who had disclosed a criminal conviction in Ireland or another jurisdiction; the number by category of offence and sentence imposed; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [65002/26]

I propose to take Questions Nos. 886 and 909 together.

The granting of Irish citizenship through naturalisation is governed by the provisions of the Irish Nationality and Citizenship Act 1956, as amended. All applications for a certificate of naturalisation are processed and assessed individually in accordance with the provisions of the Act.

All applicants are required to satisfy the good character criterion under Section 15 of the Act. As part of the naturalisation application, an applicant is required to detail all offences, regardless of where an incident occurred, or how long ago, and including “spent” convictions. The Act does not provide that having a criminal conviction, of itself, precludes a person from being granted citizenship.

My Department does not collate statistics on the number of persons granted naturalisation who disclosed a criminal conviction, nor does it record such cases by offence type or sentence imposed. Accordingly, the information sought by the Deputy is not available.

Similarly, my Department does not maintain records of naturalisation refusals categorised by the specific good character considerations referred to by the Deputy, including criminal convictions, pending criminal proceedings, Garda investigations, tax matters, immigration offences, fraud or national security concerns. Accordingly, the detailed breakdown requested is not available.

All adult applicants must undertake the Gardaí e-vetting process or other police vetting processes as deemed necessary. The details of offences listed in the e-vetting report(s) will be cross referenced with the information provided by the applicant during the initial application submission.

As part of the good character assessment, An Garda Síochána is requested to make enquiries into the applicant’s background; the detail and extent of which is a matter for An Garda Síochána. For sound security and operational reasons, it is not the practice to comment on the enquiries that may be conducted.

Should any relevant information be reported to my Department it will be associated to that person's naturalisation application.

Last week, Minister O'Callaghan and I secured Government approval for the priority drafting of legislation to strengthen Ireland's naturalisation framework. The proposed draft legislation is intended to simultaneously strengthen the integrity of the naturalisation system and align Ireland more closely with processes in several other EU Member States.