‘Shambles’ Home Office still keeping tens of thousands waiting for passports to be issued, says Yvette Cooper
Chaos surrounding the processing of passport applications is continuing with tens of thousands still reportedly waiting for one to be issued – putting their summer holidays at risk.
Home office figures showed there were now under 3,300 civil servants working full time on the issue, down from almost 4,000 over the last couple of years.
It was revealed that more than 35,00 had to wait more than three months for a new passport, the government revealed after Labour shadow home secretary asked a question in parliament.
Yvette Cooper said: “The Home Office is a shambles and Ministers are totally failing to get a grip.
“Thousands of people have already had to wait more than ten weeks for their passports, far too many passports are getting lost in the system and no one can get proper information out of the helpline.
“The Government has failed to plan and badly mismanaged our services – this is the Tories’ Backlog Britain and it is letting families down.”
The large backlog, due to a lack of staff to process the post-pandemic rush to get away, could put millions of people’s holiday plans in jeopardy.
Britain’s biggest airports have been experiencing unprecedented travel mayhem, with Gatwick and Heathrow having daily queues and delays, as it struggles to keep pace with demand from holidaymakers.