The Government has failed to guarantee the passport backlog will be cleared by the summer holidays, amid calls to reinstate Post Office-issued 12-month travel documents. Home Office minister Kevin Foster was pressed by Labour MP Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) to answer if the backlog will be sorted by July 22, when schools in England and Wales break up for their summer holidays.
Hundreds of thousands of people have suffered delays with their passport applications, with the Government setting a 10-week target compared to three weeks in a normal year. The Government expects 9.5 million British passport applications to be dealt with in 2022, with Covid restrictions on travel resulting in just four million applications in 2020 and five million in 2021 by comparison.
Mr Smith highlighted the millions of overseas visits, including school holidays, during the third quarter of the year before asking in the Commons: “To help families get away, will the Passport Office backlog be cleared by July 22?”
