irish citizenship help pls

[amiramum]

I am an irish passport holder born and raised in northern ireland.. my husband is a non eu citizen but living here in northern ireland coming to 3 years. We want to apply for irish citizenship for him based on his marriage to me but im getting totally lost with the application forms as its really meant to be filled in but somone living in roi. U would appreciate if someone could give me so advice.

Is there anywere u can call for help with the application?
The residency checker I cant understand as non of them stamps types are one my husband is on ( hes here on eea residence card)
Ita asking for gnib number and ppi numbers but we dont have them in the north?
And lastly im really struggling to find someone to counter sign our documents and witness us signing the application as when I call solicitors hey say it 1000 pound to help us with the application when I asked can rhey not just sign the papers they said no.

Any help would be so much appreciated

[Brigid from Ireland]

You can travel to Dublin or any part of Republic and ask for help in a citizen's information centre. It would be best to phone in advance and see if the staff in the centre you travel to have any knowledge of this first. The Citizens Information centres also sometimes have solicitors for free, and you can ring to get an appointment to see one (they are only there for a few hours per week).

Give your NI (national insurance) number in Britain and use this instead of pps number. Write a letter to explain that you live in North and have NI instead of pps, and that you have no GNIB number. This is not a problem at all.

There is usually a list of people who can sign as witness - what professions are on the list? A solicitor will charge to help with the application and it is about 1000 euro, but Irish solicitiors usually only charge about 50 euro to witness a document. Can a police officer witness it, or a teacher - it is a while since I have seen one of these, so I can't remember?