How did they get it so wrong on passports?

ONE minute’s thought. That’s all it would have taken anyone in Whitehall with an ounce of common sense – let alone patriotic feeling – to understand the offensiveness of handing a Franco-Dutch firm the contract to print true-blue British passports.

But, no, it seems civil service automatons have become so conditioned to obeying Brussels edicts without question that it simply didn’t occur to them that this crass decision would provoke a public outcry.

Indeed, while our partners blithely ignore rules that clash with their national interest, no bureaucracy has been more slavish than ours in following EU diktats to the letter.

Hence Whitehall’s insistence (rubberstamped by a Home Secretary asleep on the job) on putting the passport contract out to Europe-wide tender.

Leave aside the commercial grounds for denying the contract to Gemalto, with its questionable stability (it has posted four profits warnings in 18 months) and reliance on cheap labour in Poland.

Forget that Britain’s tried-and-tested De La Rue has missed not a single delivery in the decade of its current contract, while its loyal workforce in the (predominantly Brexit-supporting) North East has never lost a day to industrial action.

Can’t ministers see the passport’s unique place in hearts and minds as the ultimate expression of our national identity? In December, when they basked in popularity after trumpeting their decision to revert to traditional blue, they seemed to understand how much it meant.

Did they really think no one would mind the passport being made abroad, by a foreign firm, to save just £12million a year?

France wouldn’t stand for it. Nor would Italy, Spain or Germany. All insist on printing their own – regardless of the EU’s ruling that major public contracts must be put out to competitive tender.

Indeed, our partners have never hesitated to exploit the loophole letting governments place orders with their own firms where national security is involved. Why did nobody in Whitehall claim this exemption?

In an ideal world, ministers and civil servants would have responded to the nation’s feelings without needing to be told. Today, they clearly need telling – which is why we urge readers to sign our petition on Page 11 or online.

With your help, we can get this terrible decision reversed.