I ask the Minister for Justice, Home Affairs and Migration to urgently address the cancellation on only two days' notice of citizenship ceremonies scheduled to take place in Killarney this week and to explain why a remote declaration-based process, already proven and used during Covid-19, could not be immediately reinstated. This was not a routine administrative appointment for those affected. It was the culmination of years of waiting, vetting and uncertainty. I know this personally.

Two close friends of my daughter, young men who are settled, working and contributing members of society, were due to attend this ceremony like many others and had organised their lives around it. They booked and paid for accommodation in Kerry. They arranged flights, trains and annual leave from work. They informed their families that the day had finally come for them. They navigated disruption, including ongoing protests in the week that was because this was to be their day. It was meant to be the moment they formally became Irish citizens. Instead, it was taken from them, with 48 hours' notice and with a mere priority in June ceremonies assigned to them.

There are also real economic consequences. Hotels and local businesses in Kerry lost income at the last minute at a time the hospitality sector is under pressure.

The emotional impact should not be underestimated. Citizenship is not just paperwork; it is belonging, recognition and security.

One of the men I mentioned requires travel for work. As part of the naturalisation process, applicants were required to submit their original passports. Because the ceremony was cancelled, those documents remain unavailable and there is no timetable for when the passport will return. This uncertainty is already affecting work performance and, indeed, their state of ease with their work position.

The situation raises very basic questions. Why were no contingency plans in place? Crucially, we can we not use the remote declaration process, exactly as it was used so successfully during the Covid-19 period?

During the pandemic, the State demonstrated great flexibility, pragmatism and compassion by allowing applicants to complete citizenship declarations remotely. That system worked. It cleared backlogs, reduced stress and upheld the dignity of applicants while maintaining the integrity of the process.

Public reaction to this cancellation has been strong. On Irish citizenship forums and community platforms, applicants report similar experiences - ceremonies cancelled with little notice, costs unrecoverable, employers frustrated, families distressed and no clear communication from the Department. There is widespread concern that this cancellation will simply add to an overburdened system creating further delays in a process that is already far too slow. This really is not acceptable. People who have complied with every requirement asked of them and who have lived, worked and paid tax here for years deserve better than an automated email and uncertainty at the final hurdle.

I am, therefore, asking the Minister of State to confirm what immediate steps are being taken to support those affected, outline when citizenship documentation will be returned or alternative travel arrangements facilitated, and commit to reinstating a remove declaration-based citizenship process as an urgent temporary measure to prevent further harm and backlog. Citizenship should be a moment of welcome and pride in our country, not disappointment and stress. Of course, we all look forward to his response.

I thank the Senator very much. I will commence by referring to the line he used to conclude his contribution. Citizenship should be a moment of great pride. It should be a great moment in life for the people who go through the process. I have had the privilege and the honour of being a Minister of State at these processes for the past year and a half. It is an absolutely great moment. Therefore, it is incredibly regrettable that thousands of people were affected because of the circumstances taking place in our country last week. There were about 5,000 applicants but, as the Senator correctly alluded to in his contribution, there was at least probably the same number again in terms of friends and family. It is great moment, particularly down in Killarney where there is a wonderful atmosphere, and it is an absolutely wonderful day. It was shattering for them. It is also incredibly disappointing for me as a Minister of State who would have been involved, and incredibly disappointing for all the staff in the Department who worked so hard to create this really wonderful and memorable day. None of us wanted to do it. Unfortunately, we had to do it because we had to be conscious of the circumstances prevailing to ensure that people would be able to safely travel there but also to get back.

In the time allowed I want to very quickly answer a couple of the points the Senator made. We have already offered a place in June to everybody who was involved in the citizenship ceremony. We look forward to meeting them in June to share with them that joy. I fully take his point about co-ordination and putting people in place. We will work with people on passport documentation to ensure we facilitate them if an issue arises in the intervening period in regard to travel or anything else.

On balance, while during Covid it was a necessary evil, as it were, to have the ceremony online, we should not take from the moment that will be with somebody for their entire life - that really wonderful moment where they stand up in a hall surrounded by so many other people, with their family looking on, and they pledge their loyalty and fidelity to the Irish State, and they become a citizen of it. That makes it worth the while. I appreciate that there is an inconvenience for people in it, but I think it makes it worth the while and that the better solution is to have an in-person ceremony rather than reverting to an online one, which we did during Covid.

I hope that helps the Senator to understand why that decision was taken. We will work with any applicant if there is a particular issue around documentation or anything like that. The last thing we want to see is people discommoded because, unfortunately, due to the actions of others, they were very much discommoded and upended in the wonderful plans that they had for the ceremony which we had to cancel.

I thank the Minister of State for going off-script and giving such a personalised response.

I am very warmed by what the Minister of State had to say. A couple of things struck me about this. There are people in society who would have rejoiced in a victory in thwarting that ceremony last week. On balance, it was reasonable to compromise and put it back to June. What I am really asking the Minister to commit to is to have in reserve a system where we can go back and use the online declarations, if such an occasion were to arise again. The blueprint is there. It should not be too hard to organise. I am very happy to hear that the Minister is going to work with those people who are discommoded by a lack of documents. That is very uplifting as well. What the Minister of State said is that the day is very important. I also worry that those people are going to be shoehorned into the June presentations and celebrations and unfortunately the people who were earmarked in the queue for June will, necessarily, be put back into the autumn. It is just an unfortunate situation that has happened, but we should be taking definite steps to make sure it does not happen again.

To reassure the Senator, the only word that I do not like is "shoehorned". We are not shoehorning anybody; we are making sure that the experience that will be available to people in June is the exact experience that they would have got at the original ceremony. We intend to make it a memorable day.

I hear what he said about the online ceremonies. God forbid, if there were such a thing as a return of the pandemic or anything else like that again, I would certainly see the validity of that. In principle though, I refer him to the earlier point that I was making: that the importance of the ceremony in itself and the actual event - the day, and everything from the judge presiding, the Minister present, the Army band playing and people's friends and family around them - the totality of that in itself is as important in so many ways to the people participating as the process they are going through because it gives a significance to the day. I would be very loath to try and take that away. I do hear what the Senator says about looking at an online ceremony in extreme circumstances but, on balance, we should work towards making sure - as we have done - that people get an opportunity to experience that wonderful ceremony.

I again thank the Minister of State for giving such an empathetic response.