COVENTRY MESSAGE BOARD

Coventry MP Geoffrey Robinson (Lab Coventry North West) told Ministers that passport offices couldn’t cope with demand following funding cuts which had cost 700 jobs.



And, speaking in the House of Commons yesterday, he highlighted the case of Amy and James Vernon who had to cancel their dream first family holiday in Ibiza with their three young children after passports failed to arrive.

The Coventry Telegraph revealed this week how delays forced them to miss their scheduled flight, and when they managed to book a new flight – and arranged to pick up passports in person at Durham, 200 miles away – further delays meant they missed their plane.

Mr Robinson said the Coundon family were among hundreds in his constituency who had suffered as a result of chaos in the Passport Office, the body responsible for passports which is overseen by the Home Office.

And nationwide, a backlog more than 500,000 passport applications were still unprocessed, said the politician.

It followed funding and staff cuts in the Passport Office, he said, adding: “And now the chickens have come home to roost.”

Mr Robinson said: “Holiday plans will have been ruined. Expenses on pre-booked scheduled un-refundable flight and hotel bookings foregone.

“Hard-working families will be cheated by this Government’s short sighted cuts and incompetence and in many cases business costs are being needlessly increased.”

He also criticised senior managers in the Passport Office for failing to act quickly enough.

The MP said: “Those who have suffered in Coventry are far too numerous to mention all by name.

“However I would like to draw the Minister’s attention to the Vernon family in Coundon in Coventry who missed their first holiday together.

“They drove 200 miles to the Durham Passport Office where delays caused them to miss their flight by 15 minutes.

“The other case in Coventry I must mention is that of Professor Cooter who has been waiting for a passport for nearly three months.

“Meanwhile – without his passport – he would miss a lecture tour in Japan and is in danger of missing his marriage registration in Berlin.”

Ministers must intervene in the crisis, he said.

Radford mum's fury as passport farce costs her £153



A COVENTRY mum had to shell out an astonishing £153 so that her teenage daughter could get a passport ahead of her school trip.

Joanne Hughes, a teaching assistant from Sadler Road, Radford, said she had a nightmare to ensure 13-year-old Ella could join her friends on a battlefields trip this week.

After sending off the Coundon Court pupil’s passport on April 23, Joanne thought her daughter’s new passport would arrive within the three week time frame advertised on the Passport Office website.

Instead, a series of administrative errors meant that Joanne had to jump through constant hoops and fork out more than she could afford.

She said: “When they lost the passport, I prepared Ella for the worst.

“I told her there was a chance she wouldn’t be able to go to Belgium – she was heartbroken.

“The amount of calls I’ve had to make is ridiculous.

“When you call the Passport Office number, it’s just a call centre – they can’t actually help you then and there.

“They say they’ll call you within 48 hours, but it’s from an unknown number.

“I’m a teaching assistant, so I can’t have my phone on me all the time.

“If you missed the call, there was no number to call back, so you had to go through the entire process all over again.”

First of all, the passport that Joanne sent was lost within the Passport Office.

Then, she was advised to forward a new application form and photographs by special delivery to a Passport Office in Glasgow.

She was then called by an office in Belfast and told that because the original passport had been lost, she would have to send the photographs again and get somebody to sign her application to confirm her identity.

Joanne continued to chase the application until finally she was offered another option: she could pay an extra £73 to receive a fast-track passport.

She said: “I paid the extra money because Ella was beside herself.

“But it’s not money I had. My husband and I are working class people, and we’ve had to use our savings for this.

“In total, it’s cost me £153.07 to renew a child’s passport, and we only received it last week.

“I am going to keep hassling until I get my money back.”

When the Telegraph contacted the Home Office, a spokesman said they would respond to Joanne directly about the delay.

Joanne’s passport difficulties come at a time when the Home Office is facing fierce criticisms over delays.

Thousands of people are still waiting for passports and the backlog has been blamed on staff cuts.

The Home Secretary has dropped fast-track processing fees amid growing anger.