Backlog Britain! Passport and driving licence delays

HUNDREDS of thousands of Britons remain paralysed by delays as Covid restrictions cause major bureaucratic backlogs.

About 00,000 people are in the queue for new passports, more than 80,000 drivers are waiting for licences posted back to them and at least 300,000 learner drivers are in limbo.

Many new parents have yet to record their babies’ births as register offices are either closed or facing a backlog of appointments.

And taxpayers ringing HMRC are having to spend longer on the phone, with the average answer time now more than 13 minutes.

Steve Baker, deputy chairman of the Covid Recovery Group of Tory MPs, said: ‘I see in my own casework that members of the public struggling with bureaucracy can be reduced to tears of despair.’

The paralysis caused by the spring lockdown was first exposed by this newspaper in July. Yet new figures show the backlog was not cleared when staff returned to the office. It is now on the rise again as many public buildings have been closed since the autumn.

As of January 18, a total of 115,604 passport applications were not processed and another 84,4 5 were work in progress. The DVLA saw a pile up of 66, 8 paper driving licence applications – twice that of November. Another 19,537 paper log books are being processed or in a queue.

And high numbers of cancellations have taken their toll on learner drivers too, with DVSA figures showing a backlog of 34 ,947 car test bookings.