Passport Office (Delays)

Debate between Tom Greatrex and Geoffrey Robinson

Tuesday 10th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robinson]

I am willing to take even more interventions as I think they are nearly as effective as this couple of photographs—I will not display them, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I will draw Members’ attention to them. They show interview rooms being used not for interview purposes but to store unprocessed files of passport applications in the course of being processed. They say that a good picture tells 1,000 words, so I refer the Minister to those photographs, which I am sure will soon be in circulation.

[Tom Greatrex (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab/Co-op)]

On that point, my hon. Friend will be aware that the Scottish school holidays start about a month earlier than in England, and therefore within a couple of weeks. I am sure he shares my concern that when people make applications for passport renewals, they do so on the basis of advice on the forms and website that it will take three to four weeks. Given that passports are not being processed in that time, should advice at least be given for people to allow more time while the chaos is dealt with?

[Mr Robinson]

I take my hon. Friend’s point, but it is not good enough—this is quoting the ineffable Mr Paul Pugh, who has already been referred to—to say that people should not book their holidays until they have their passports. At the present rate of progress, some might not get their passports for a year, and could not book their holidays. Anyway, how could people book now when all the best package deals are gone and the best hotels booked? It shows how out of touch the Passport Office, the Government and Ministers are with the real world of our constituents.