The Department of Justice spent more than €1.8 million on deportation flights over a four-year period including at least €422,000 on business class flights for escort officers returning from operations.
The department said expenditure was sometimes necessary for executive seats when a deportation officer was immediately returning to Ireland from a long-haul flight without staying at the destination.
Records show that spending on deportation flights last year amounted to €1.09 million, of which around €262,000 covered business class travel.
For 2023, total expenditure on removal operations was roughly €463,000 with around a third of the total – or €161,000 – paid for business seats.
The rate of expenditure has been increasing as only €219,000 was spent in 2022 and €37,000 was paid for flights during 2021.
Deportation operations were heavily curtailed during the Covid-19 pandemic with only a small number of removals, usually where serious criminality was involved.
Figures provided under FOI show that there was a total of 156 deportation orders carried out by air last year.
This included 66 people from Georgia, 19 from South Africa, 15 from Albania, 14 from Brazil, 7 from Algeria and 7 from Nigeria.
For 2023, there were 80 removals carried out. This was made up of 18 people from Georgia, 9 from Brazil, 9 from South Africa, 8 from Pakistan, and 6 from Nigeria.
There were a further 30 deportations to other countries that year, but the department does not provide a breakdown where the nationality numbers are less than five to avoid possible identification of a person.
The number of orders effected in 2022 was 118, with 20 Nigerians, 18 Pakistani citizens, and 14 Albanians removed from the State.
Others deported that year included 13 from Georgia, 11 from Brazil, 9 from China including Hong Kong, and 9 from India.
For 2021, when just 38 deportations were carried out, the figures included 13 people from Pakistan and 5 from Albania.
The Government has promised a significant rise in the number of removal operations that will be carried out each year.
In February, the first of several planned chartered flights left the state carrying 32 people to Georgia, including three women and a child, at a cost of around €102,000.
An information note from the department said about flight costs: “Business class travel is used in limited circumstances for operational reasons and subject to case-by-case approval.
“In particular, it can be approved for return leg travel from certain countries by escort staff in circumstances where for operational reasons a quick turnaround is necessary and officers return on the next available flight rather than entering the country.”
The department said in these cases the officers involved did not avail of hotel accommodation and that the business class travel was “availed of to the return [airport] hub only.”
