§ Mr. Cockeramasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what further details have been agreed on the European common format passport.
§ Mr. HurdThe resolution of member States of 23 June 1981 on a common format for the national passports of member States left a few minor points for consideration by a specialist working party. Member States agreed on 30 June to a supplementary resolution approving the results of that work. I shall arrange for the full text of the resolution to be placed in the Library of the House as soon as it is available in London. Among other items, it covers 65W the size of the passport, which is to be based on the dimensions for the machine readable card, as already agreed by the International Civil Aviation Organisation—125 mm × 88 mm—plus a margin of 2mm on each side for binding purposes. The resolution also deals with the cover material and refers to a preference for a flexible cover. We have made it clear, and our partners accept, that we are not bound by this preference and that no decision on cover material has yet been taken so far as the United Kingdom common format passport is concerned.