Melissa MacKinnon and her husband Michael Hogan always planned to move to Ireland to be closer to his family, but the political situation in the US sped up the process.
MacKinnon (53) and Hogan (56) lived in Los Angeles for 18 years before relocating to his native Killaloe, Co Clare, in 2022.
The US was in between Trump presidencies then and MacKinnon “had a feeling it was going to happen again”.
“He was not in office when we moved but I saw that, either by hook or by crook, he was going to get himself back in there. I didn’t want to be in the US when that happened,” she says.
READ MORE
The couple are among the thousands of people who move from the US to Ireland annually. There was a 96 per cent increase in the numbers making the switch (from 4,900 to 9,600) between April 2024 and last April, according to Central Statistics Office figures.
Relocations and returns take considerable planning. Finding accommodation and employment were among the most pressing tasks for MacKinnon and Hogan, but proved more straightforward than something further down their list of priorities: getting driving licences.
“I don’t think anybody, when they’re doing their research to come over here, even thinks twice about a driver’s licence,” MacKinnon says.
Both have been driving for more than 30 years and expected they would be able to exchange their US licences for Irish ones or, at the very least, not have to “start from scratch”.
MacKinnon says they respect the laws and regulations but it does not “make sense” to treat seasoned motorists the same as learners, particularly when there are long waiting lists to sit a driving test.
Before moving to the US, Hogan had an Irish licence for about 20 years but it expired before he returned. The process of obtaining new licences took almost two years, MacKinnon says, and “negatively impacted our ability to work and live here”.
She works in administration and Hogan runs a food truck, so driving is essential for his job. The couple were lucky Hogan had relatives who could give them lifts, she says, but “not everybody has that luxury”.
Since obtaining her licence, she says motor insurance has been “through the roof” as she is treated the same as a novice driver.
People who move to Ireland and hold a driving licence from countries including the US can drive on Irish roads for up to a year. After that period, people from certain countries (or certain regions of Canada) can exchange their licence for an Irish one. However, the US is not among them. Holders of foreign licences who cannot exchange their licence here may be eligible to take six driving lessons instead of the usual 12 for a learner.
MacKinnon says she understands the value of drivers from other countries taking a theory test, so they are up to speed with Irish rules and road signage. However, she believes “there’s got to be some sort of happy medium there, or some way to expedite it for people who need to get to jobs and need to drive their kids to doctors’ appointments”.
A new report says thousands of experienced drivers like her “face an unnecessarily burdensome process to get an Irish driving licence”, which “creates a significant financial burden and impacts their ability to travel to work and live their lives”.
The Irish-US Driver’s License Exchange Campaign, a group with US and Irish members, on Wednesday sent a report on the issue to Minister for Transport Darragh O’Brien and the Road Safety Authority (RSA) “for urgent review and action”.
It makes a number of recommendations including that Ireland should prioritise licence-exchange agreements with US states that already have reciprocal arrangements with other EU countries. It also calls for statutory instruments to be amended to allow for unilateral and reciprocal foreign licence recognition, and for “reinstatement” of Irish driving licences that have been expired for more than 10 years if the person holds a current licence from another country.
The report was co-authored by Larry Donnelly, an Irish-American law lecturer, and Damian Greene, a Cork-based pharmaceutical consultant.
Greene (66) and his wife Joyce (67) emigrated from Ireland to New York in 1988. In 2012, they relocated to Belgium and were able to exchange their US licences for Belgian ones. They returned to Ireland in 2019.
“We drove in Ireland for six years on our Belgian licences, as is the EU law,” Greene says.
When these were due for renewal, he says the RSA told them this could not be done “because they would not recognise my US driving licence that had been exchanged”.
Greene says this came as “a major shock” as he and Joyce had been driving in Ireland without issue for years. They live in Schull, Co Cork and found being unable to drive very difficult and isolating. Limited public transport options left them relying on lifts from neighbours to go buy groceries and other essentials.
Greene has since secured an Irish driving licence and Joyce is in the process of getting hers. He described taking driving lessons after 45 years of motoring as “an interesting life experience”.
He says the campaign’s report offers “practical” and “pragmatic” solutions to the issue. Members of the group are due to present their findings to TDs and Senators in Leinster House next Tuesday, April 28th.
It was founded by Safe Home Ireland, a diaspora organisation funded by the Department of Foreign Affairs that provides services for ex-pats returning to Ireland.
Ciarán Staunton, committee co-chair, says many ex-pats do not realise they cannot exchange their US driving licence when they return to Ireland.
He welcomes a commitment in the programme for government to examine “reciprocal driving licence arrangements with the USA, Australia and Canada”, but does not believe it is a priority.
“I am getting a lot of excuses but no answers or solutions,” he says. “If EU countries have these deals – and Ireland’s a member of the EU – why can’t Ireland?”
The Department of Transport was contacted for comment.
It previously said Ireland has a licence-exchange agreement with Australia and seven of the 10 Canadian provinces, but the US system was more complicated as arrangements operate at state rather than federal level.
“This means that there are 50 licensing systems, with widely varying testing standards and road safety performance,” it said.
The RSA said that reaching exchange agreements with non-EU countries was “a technical process, not a political process” and that for agreements to be reached, licensing authorities in both countries must compare licensing regimes to ensure they are compatible, a process that can take up to two years.
It said it had explored reaching an agreement with the US but found it would “not be feasible” as agreement with any one state would involve taking into account exchange agreements between that state and the other 49.
The State agency did, however, say it was at “varying stages of engagement” with New York, Massachusetts and New Jersey on a licence agreement and “will continue these engagements over the coming years”.
