I'm Irish...

[daveon]

I've been thinking for sometime about sorting out an Irish passport and I've known for a while that in "theory" I'm Irish, it's just nice to have somebody in a position of authority to tell me so. I asked what I needed to get the passport, assuming I'd first need some form of "proof" to be obtained.

"But your father is Irish?"
"Yes."
"Then so are you. Nothing else required."
"Oh, OK."

So all I need to do is get my photo's signed by somebody, probably I'll track down an old family friend from the Garda before TCASU, send off my Dad's birth certificate, his wedding certificate and my documentation and a cheque.

I expected it to be a little more complicated than that.

Comments

[marypcb.livejournal.com]

what counts as 'Irish' for the purpose? My father is from Belfast, though he moved to England long ago; would it be where he was born? Or if he has an Irish passpport himself? I've always thought it would be fun to get an Irish passport myself (Dorothy L Sayers: there's no-one as offensively mongrel as the English)

[camies.livejournal.com]

why 'offensively'?

[del-c.livejournal.com]

"But your father is Irish?"
"Yes."
"Then so are you. Nothing else required."

For a second there I thought you meant you didn't have to prove your dad was Irish, just assert it. The next paragraph with your dad's birth certificate restored my sense of reality :-)

[daveon.livejournal.com]

This is a difficult one according to the web site. You'd have to apply for a certificate of citzenship first, I think, unless your father was born before December 1922.

I'm getting one because I'm getting slightly paranoid about all the travelling I've been doing :-/

[daveon.livejournal.com]

Well, in the context I kind of assumed I'd need to get a certificate or something before applying for the passport.

[marypcb.livejournal.com]

mmm - he might have been. My mum was born in 1920. Shall write and ask him!

[marypcb.livejournal.com]

it's what she has Peter say about being inordinately proud of being one-thirtysecond French; the English are a mongrel breed who are both fiercely nationalistic and oddly proud of their mixed descent.

[major-clanger.livejournal.com]

Actually, all you need to claim Irish citizenship is one Irish grandparent. For that matter, 'Irish' in that context turns out to mean born in either Eire or the North; before 1923 they were part of the same country, and afterwards (and until relatively recently) Eire claimed Ulster, and so considered those born there to be entitled to Irish citizenship.

MC

[marypcb.livejournal.com]

hmmm; I know *his* grandmother was Irish - she brought him up. That would make him Irish, which would make me Irish too ;-) This is all, in fact, quite quintessentially Irish!

[daveon.livejournal.com]

Be warned though, with the Grandparent route you first need to obtain a certificate of citizenship.

[camies.livejournal.com]

A lot of people seem to want not to be English, claiming that if they have foreign ancestry (and who doesn't?) they can't be English. Irish on the other hand is something generally aspired to.

[pmcray.livejournal.com]

My brother has an Irish passport. I'll talk to him about it when I see him tomorrow. It involved sending my dad's birth certificate off, if I recall correctly.