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Mr. Straw: Many other Members wish to speak. I have already accepted about three times as many interventions from the opposite Benches as the right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald, and I now wish to complete my speech.
Let me say more about the IT system, and the problems that have arisen. Testing of the new system was completed in time for it to be introduced on a pilot basis in the Liverpool office on 5 October, and in the Newport office six weeks later. The pilot started in the low season for UKPA business, so that disruption to customers could be minimised. However, two significant problems then arose.
First, the new working processes, which involved additional checking, required more staff than was envisaged. That is true both for the parts of the system operated by the private sector and for the parts operated by the agency.
Miss Widdecombe:
Will the Home Secretary give way?
Mr. Straw:
I will give way to the right hon. Lady in a moment, if she will just listen to the explanation.
Secondly, some loss of output was expected in the pilot's early stages and was built into the project plans, not least the provision for making the changes in the autumn quiet season and for staffing changes. However, loss of output was greater than the agency anticipated. Despite that, more than 1 million of the new, more secure passports have been issued on the new system. A recent independent audit has confirmed that the new system's design is sound.
I in no sense minimise the problems and disruption that have been caused to individuals by the difficulties in the passport office, but output since April--since we put the action plan in place--has risen consistently and is now running at record levels: about 150,000 passports a week.
The Passport Agency increased the number of passport examiners by 250 through recruitment and promotion. Staff throughout the agency have been working high levels of overtime at weekends and in the evenings. However, it is now obvious that the roll-out is lasting longer than the agency expected, and that more staff are required than the agency envisaged at the planning stage.
On children's passports--the following point is important, too--applications were initially rather less than expected when the new changes came into force in October 1998. That may have given false reassurance to the agency. The agency went to considerable lengths to
get outside advice from Government statisticians about the likely level of applications from and in respect of children. As it happens, for some months after the introduction of the change, the level of applications was lower, rather than higher, than anticipated,
I point out two things to those who are concerned about the idea of a baby's photograph being put on a passport. First, of the 400,000 voluntary applications for children's passports, quite a number have been in respect of babies. Secondly, although we all understand that a photograph of a baby may not provide the same identity two or three years later--in some cases, even a few months later--the immigration service and all the child abduction pressure groups say that the totality of the evidence provided by a passport provides far better reassurance and security checking than a simple name on someone else's passport ever does.
Mr. Straw:
The right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald wished to ask a question.
Miss Widdecombe:
It seems that, in that explanation, the right hon. Gentleman has confirmed what we said earlier--there was a coincidence, which I now realise, given the timetable that he has set out, was even closer than I thought. In October, it became law that children had to have their own passports and, again in October, the first experiments were tried. Why were two brand new burdens put on the Passport Agency at exactly the same time? That was underlying all the questions that I asked earlier. I still have not had an answer to that one.
Mr. Straw:
I have given the right hon. Lady an answer. There has never been the least secret about the fact that the change in the application arrangements for children's passports was introduced at the same time as changes in the procedures and the pilot IT system. The two were designed to be integrated, and for good reasons. It was much more cost-effective to do that. As we were making changes to the system by which passports were produced--which will, I hope, last for many years--it made sense at the same time to make changes in the application procedure, which, in respect of children, simplify the procedure; there is one application for each person, not one application that may include a number of other people.
Mr. Straw:
No. That was the last intervention.
As I have explained, as it happened, the application levels in respect of children in the first five or six months of the new pilots being rolled out were lower, rather than higher, than we anticipated. Since April, however, the intake of applications for both children and adults has shown a significant rise--well in excess of normal seasonal trends. Current figures show intake 40 per cent. higher than last year. If that pattern continues, this year's intake will be the highest ever.
The agency tells me that intake is expected to fall sharply at some stage next month and that it will then be able to deal quickly with the arrears. It tells me--I expect this to be achieved--that the time for clearing properly completed applications will be down to 10 days by the end of September. With the extra staff now being brought in, the agency expects to be able to hold that level of performance in future.
The agency has quite rightly deferred plans to roll out the new system into the remaining offices until the arrears are cleared this autumn. It is not true, as the right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald has tried to insinuate, that, once the system had been set in train, no alterations were made to the programme to take account of the increase in demand. We have had to make sensible changes to the arrangements to ensure that demand can be coped with.
Mr. Andrew Miller (Ellesmere Port and Neston):
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his detailed explanation. I am sure that my constituents will welcome his observations. It is a pity that I did not get an apology when I had to queue all the way round Liverpool passport office, but that was under the previous Administration. I do not remember any apology or any explanation on the record to the House.
Mr. Straw:
It is doubtful whether my hon. Friend would ever have received an apology from a Minister because, as I said earlier, Ministers under the previous Administration were seeking to evade responsibility and, so far as they could, never to say they were sorry.
The current backlogs have resulted in severe problems with the telephone service. People are understandably anxious when they have submitted their applications some time ago and have not heard anything, so there has been a significant but understandable surge in inquiries by telephone and fax. In May alone, the agency recorded more than 1.5 million calls, many of which have gone unanswered. The agency has had to make the difficult operational decision between using staff to answer the telephone or to concentrate on passport issuing to ensure that passports are received in time to travel. It has chosen to do the latter, but I acknowledge the anxiety and frustration that has resulted, and so does the agency.
Steps are now being taken to provide an adequate telephone service for passport inquiries. I am sorry to say that those changes will be too late to deal with the current problems. We do know that once turnround times are brought down to 10 days, call volumes will drop dramatically, to levels at which the agency can provide an acceptable service. By the autumn, the agency should have brought the present unsatisfactory situation under control and the extra staff should enable lasting improvements to be made.
The framework document to which I referred earlier is due for review later this year. The current chief executive, David Gatenby, who has been in post since 1994, told the Home Office late last year of his decision to retire this summer. A new chief executive, Mr. Bernard Herdan, has been appointed to take up his post on 1 October. One of his first tasks will be to conduct the review of the framework document. There will be a substantial independent element in that review and Ministers will be taking a close interest in its outcome.
I should like to pay tribute to the staff of the agency. They have worked extraordinarily long hours in difficult circumstances to ensure that travel needs are met. I thank the right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald for her tribute to the staff. This, at least, is not remotely a party issue. As the right hon Lady and I have seen--as have many of my right hon. and hon. Friends--the staff have shown extraordinary good humour in difficult circumstances.
Miss Widdecombe:
Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
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