Aileen Gittens

Aileen joined the Poe Kiely Hogan Lanigan team in 2023, and established the firm’s Immigration Department.

She came to PKHL with over 10 years’ experience working as a solicitor, having trained with one of Ireland’s largest corporate law firms and having spent the last 7 years specialising in immigration law.

In 2026, Aileen was promoted to a Partner in the firm’s ‘Surrogacy: Pathways to Parenthood and Immigration’ department. Since joining the firm she has assisted numerous domestic and international surrogacy clients advising them on all aspects of the Irish legal process. The recent changes and refocusing of the department means that Aileen can bring her unique experiences to bear in both specialist immigration and citizenship law cases along with surrogacy and donor-assisted human reproduction law.

Aileen has significant experience in all aspects of immigration law; EU treaty rights residence applications, employment permits, visas, naturalisation, citizenship, foreign birth registration, family reunification applications and all types of residency applications (Irish citizen child, Stamp 0, change of immigration status, etc). She is adept at all types of immigration applications and has successfully represented clients in a variety of statutory and administrative immigration appeals and High Court Judicial Review applications.

Aileen is passionate about rights-based legal issues and this is what drives her practice of immigration law. She volunteered with FLAC (Free Legal Advice Centre) for many years and, more recently, has taken pro-bono immigration cases for Crosscare, and the Public Interest Law Alliance.

Aileen lectures on the Law Society of Ireland’s Certificate in Immigration Law and Practice and is a founding committee member and current Secretary of the Irish Immigration Lawyers Association.

Outside of work, Aileen lives in the Carlow countryside with her family. She is a keen runner and athletics fan, and likes to try her hand at gardening at home. Her favourite quote is “from little things, big things grow”. This helps her to keep the faith that one day, she might actually become a good gardener.

Immigration law, Administrative law, Employment law, General Litigation, Surrogacy law, Domestic Surrogacy, and International Surrogacy.

Law Society of Ireland, Irish Immigration Lawyers Association (IILA).

BCL, Dip Emp Law, Adv Dip Immig Law

Aileen graduated from University College Dublin with a First Class Honour’s Bachelor in Civil Law Degree, and qualified as a Solicitor with the Law Society of Ireland in 2012.

In 2013, Aileen obtained a distinction in the Professional Diploma in Employment law from University College Dublin. Aileen obtained an Advanced Diploma from the King’s Inns in Immigration and Asylum Law in 2017.