Holiday worries fuel huge queues at passport offices

HOLIDAYMAKERS formed huge queues at passport offices across the country yesterday amid warnings that delays for new documents could last several months.

Families may be forced to cancel summer holidays after average waiting times for passports rocketed to more than ten weeks.

The huge backlog of around 700,000 applications has added to criticism of civil servants working from home, including the £160,000recently a-year boss of the Passport Office, Abi Tierney.

Queues formed yesterday outside the seven passport centres across the UK which offer a £142 fast-track service in a bid by holidaymakers to avoid missing out on trips.

Among them was Chloe Dyer, who travelled from South Yorkshire to wait outside the passport centre in Liverpool.

The mother, who is due to fly to Greece with her family soon, said: ‘We’ve had a hard time as a family and I’m worried we won’t get our holiday. It’s my kids I feel for.’ She said she would lose all the money spent on the holiday if she could not get a passport.

Nancy Brodrick-Lecaudey, 37, said she was unable to return to work in France because her fiveyear-old son’s passport has less than three months validity left. They cannot leave until his new passport has been processed.

She said: ‘I’m probably going to have to leave him here with my parents while I return, which means he’ll be without his mum for maybe two months, and he’s never been without me before.’

One Passport Office worker said: ‘It’s going to last weeks. There’s nowhere near enough staff. The people in call centres aren’t being given training so it’s all a bit chaotic… they’ve basically been dragged in off the street.’

Mrs Tierney, 48, who lives in Leicestershire, was called to No10 on Thursday to explain to ministers the ‘shambolic’ waiting times.

A Passport Office spokesman said they had increased staff numbers to ‘deal with the demand’.