Theresa May was today forced to go to the House of Commons to explain the “crisis” at the UK’s passport service.
The Home Secretary was accused of “burying her head in the sand” by Labour after it emerged a huge backlog of 30,000 applications had massed.
The Home Office intervened this morning to prevent passport officers relaxing checks in a bid to reduce the backlog. Ministers said delays which threaten thousands of holidays were down to a surge in applications, but unions blame coalition cuts.
Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “This is seriously chaotic. The Government is in denial about the extent of the crisis at the passport office despite being warned months ago.”
Speaking in the Commons Ms May said she would set in place measures including a 12-month extension to people’s existing passport if they are travelling to the UK from overseas.
The Guardian today published details of a leaked briefing note issued to HM Passport Office staff in Liverpool, Durham and Belfast, instructing them to ease checks to speed up turnaround times. But the Home Office said ministers had not been informed of the note and had demanded it be rescinded.
It was announced earlier that new offices would open to ease the backlog. But PCS union spokesman Lawrence Dunne told LBC radio: “This isn’t a new problem. We’ve been warning the government and passport agency for years that cuts in the passport office meant that actually they had no resilience.”
