118. Deputy Sorca Clarke asked the Minister for Justice, Home Affairs and Migration the status of two citizenship applications (details supplied); the reason for the continued delay in issuing approval letters following the Department's confirmation that a back end technical fault affecting these 2022 files was resolved on 26 August 2026 (details supplied); the outstanding steps, including any digital sign-off, required to finalise and release these grants of citizenship; and the timeframe for completion. [67350/26]

The applications referred to by the Deputy continue to be processed by the Citizenship Division.

I understand that extended wait times can be frustrating for applicants. I want to assure anyone who has an application for naturalisation submitted that the Citizenship Division of my Department is doing everything possible to progress applications as quickly as possible.

It is important to note that no two naturalisation applications are the same and some take longer than others to process. Given the importance of citizenship, robust and comprehensive checks must take place on each application. Unfortunately, some international checks can take a considerable amount of time and these are largely outside of the control of the Immigration Service.

Citizenship Division have also taken a significant number of steps to speed up the process for applicants. These included introducing an online digital application, online payments, and the introduction of eVetting. I am pleased to inform the Deputy that these changes are dramatically reducing processing times.

As an Oireachtas member, you can also request the status of individual immigration cases by e-mail, using the Oireachtas Mail facility at: IMoireachtasmail@justice.ie, which has been specifically established for this purpose. This service enables up to date information on such cases to be obtained without the need to seek information by way of the Parliamentary Question process.