45877 (2025). Ingrid Leary to the Minister of Internal Affairs

45877 (2025). Ingrid Leary to the Minister of Internal Affairs: Are citizenship applications from former Palestinians, now based in New Zealand, currently being processed as quickly as citizenship applications from other locations; if not, why not?

Hon Brooke van Velden: I am advised by the Department of Internal Affairs, that applications are generally allocated to officers based on date of receipt. While there is no urgent citizenship service, in rare circumstances the Department may be able to assess an application out of the standard queue order. However, this does not affect the time required for completing all the necessary checks. In rare cases, where an applicant has an urgent need for citizenship, applicants can be allocated based on urgent need. This can include humanitarian need. Applicants from Palestine are processed in the same way as other applicants. There is no specific policy or process for Palestinian applicants, although an applicant may request urgency and be allocated for processing ahead of other applicants. Criteria for urgency is published on the govt.nz website. Time taken to process individual applications varies depending on whether external checks are made and the results of these checks. These vary between individuals.