MOST PEOPLE will be surprised at the Government's decision to review the fast-track system whereby TDs can secure passports for constituents more rapidly than members of the public who use the normal application channels. The public were - and are - largely unaware of this premium passport service which TDs have quietly provided to their constituents for more than a decade.
Equally, they will be surprised by the apparent anxiety of so many Dáil deputies to retain what has become an outdated, and unnecessary, arrangement. Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern has asked for a review of the facility and has questioned whether it should be continued. TDs handled 6,000 special applications for passports last year which is an average of 36 for every Dáil member.
This express system for elected members was introduced in 1994 at a time when long queues outside the passport office in Molesworth Street in Dublin were a common sight. People, rightly, were unhappy with the undue delay involved in acquiring or renewing passports. Since then, however, the passport office has been transformed. The passport service has greatly benefited from major investment which has enabled it to handle a greater volume of applications more rapidly. Today a postal application for a passport takes about 14 days to process. If that suggests a highly efficient public service, it also means the role of the TD in the processing of passports is superfluous. When the passport service was not working, the involvement of politicians was understandable - and justifiable in certain limited and exceptional cases. The service the Department of Foreign Affairs provides is now working well. Accordingly, the continued involvement by Dáil deputies in passport provision is neither necessary nor desirable.
The Dáil does not elect 166 TDs to perform the role of passport facilitators, particularly when the passport office can meet public demand for its service within a reasonable time. A continued role for the TD in passport provision amounts to little more than clientilism. That political tendency should be curbed. The intervention of a third party to secure a constituent's statutory entitlement, such as a passport, smacks of an outdated form of political patronage. A faster provision of passports for the 6,000 clients of TDs amounts to little more than queue jumping by a minority. For the patient majority, who have applied for their passports in the normal way, receive a slower service in consequence.
If TDs can provide constituents with an express service for passports, then why not more special arrangements, perhaps to include the express provision of medical cards or driving licences? Undoubtedly, the intense competition for votes has resulted in TDs offering a greater range of services to win the voting support of the public. That helps explain a remarkable figure, those 6,000 TD-assisted passport applications last year. The passport privileges enjoyed by Dáil deputies are expensive to operate as they involve more staff, which involves an extra burden on the taxpayer. They should be withdrawn.