Tomorrow the Mail’ s passport petition goes to D owning Street. Will you add YOUR name to the 286,000 who’ ve already signed?

As Mail prepares to hand over nearly 300,000 signatures, new doubts over how deal was done

NEW doubts were cast yesterday on claims that a foreign firm got the contract to make Britain’s post- Brexit blue passports because it was better for price, quality and security.

No 10 refused to back allegations by immigration minister Caroline Nokes, who told MPs last week that the Franco-Dutch firm Gemalto had won the deal on ‘all counts’.

The British firm which wants to make them, De La Rue, has since said it came out ahead of Gemalto on both quality and security – a vital consideration in the contract to produce the new passports.

Tomorrow the Daily Mail will go to Downing Street to deliver our petition demanding post-Brexit blue passports be made in the UK. By last night it had been signed by 286,195 readers.

It means there is little more than 24 hours left to sign if you want your voice to be heard in the heart of government, although you can still add your name after then. It takes seconds to log on to our website and register your support. Since our campaign began 11 days ago, thousands have signed either online or by swamping our offices by posting back our coupons.

Last week Miss Nokes told the Commons: ‘The reality is that in a fair procurement process, we had to look at quality, security and price, and this was the contract that provided the best value on all counts.’

But Downing Street yesterday distanced itself from her claim. A spokesman for the Prime Minister twice declined to defend the claim.

Asked if it was the Government’s ‘official position’ that Gemalto won on price, quality and security, as Miss Nokes had suggested, the spokesman said: ‘ We are still in a legal process so I am restricted in what I can say.

‘All I can say is the preferred bidder demonstrated they would be best able to meet the needs of our Passport Service with a high quality and secure product that delivers the best value for money for the taxpayer.’

Asked again if the Prime Minister agreed with Miss Nokes that Gemalto was ahead on all three measures, the spokesman said: ‘I haven’t got anything to add on that.’

In a statement yesterday signalling its readiness to go to court over the issue, De La Rue said that, based on its expert knowledge of the market, it believed it was ‘the highest quality and technically most secure bid’, even if not the cheapest.

The 200-year-old British firm believes Gemalto, which is partly owned by the French government, won by tabling an offer deliberately below cost price. The Home Office says the outsourcing move would save up to £120million over 11-and-a-half years.

Downing Street confirmed that the ‘standstill period’ during which rivals can challenge the award of the contract had been extended for a fortnight at De La Rue’s request. It was originally supposed to expire yesterday.

But the spokesman denied this meant ministers were having a rethink, saying: ‘This has been a rigorous and open com-

petition. The preferred bidder demonstrated they were best able to meet the needs of the Passport Service. That remains the Government’s position.’

It came as MPs and peers last night called on the Home Office to ‘come clean’ about where Britain’s passports would be made before the Gemalto deal is finalised.

The Home Office said it would not discuss where the documents would be produced and Gemalto has also failed to answer several questions posed by the Mail.

A Home Office source indicated yesterday that the entire process will happen inside Europe and the UK. But the Government department would not issue an official statement confirming it. It has led to fears the booklets could be made outside of Europe.

The Home Office has said the passport personalisation process, when personal details are added and biometric chips programmed, will take place in the UK. But it is still unclear where the blank booklets will be made.

The current burgundy passports are printed at De La Rue’s plant in Bathford in Somerset before being assembled and personalised in its Gateshead factory, where up to 200 jobs are at risk.

Tory MP Peter Bone said: ‘There are many questions to be answered and one of them is where on earth are these passports actually going to be printed. Are the passports actually going to be made and printed in France or printed in some sweatshop in the Far East?

‘We’re not talking about pizza advertising leaflets, we’re talking about the great British passport... we need to have the answer to these questions.’

Labour’s John Spellar said: ‘They need to come clean about where the actual production will take place. Will it be in Europe or could it even be in the Far East?

‘They need to answer the question – are they going to be cutting costs by offshoring to low-wage countries? The British public have a right to know. Those are questions that should be answered now and it would be absolutely right to do so before the deal is finalised.’

Tory peer Lord Naseby said: ‘Some companies that want to gain business do put forward bids that are below the normal market price, called “loss leaders”, and I am questioning whether this part state- owned company is not in fact doing a loss leader bid.

‘Against that background, I ask myself where are the passports actually being manufactured? Are they being manufactured in France, or some of the French territories or even abroad and if they’re abroad one thinks about China and places like that.’

Last month the Mail visited a Gemalto-owned factory in Poland, where a former worker at the plant in the northern town of Tczew said they suspect the firm might want to use the facility because Polish wages are up to two-thirds lower than in Britain.

De La Rue has held the contract, now estimated to be valued at £490million, for producing British passports since 2009 and makes around eight million of them a year. It is drawing up a court challenge opposing the Government’s decision.

PIECE by piece, Britain’s De La Rue is building a powerful case against the Home Office’s baffling and unpatriotic decision to give a Franco-Dutch firm the contract to print post-Brexit blue passports.

Indeed, suspicions grow that Gemalto cynically bid at below cost price, risking quality and security. (And how significant that Downing Street has not backed up Whitehall claims that the European firm won the contract on every measure.)

Meanwhile, questions arise over where the passports will be made if Gemalto finalises the deal. Unthinkably, it has even been suggested that such security-sensitive documents may be produced by cheap labour in the Third World.

Today, readers have their last chance to add their names to more than 286,000 on the Mail’s petition demanding a rethink, before it is presented to No 10 tomorrow. One more push – and we may yet win victory for British jobs, security and national pride.