§ Mrs. DunwoodyTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will introduce a new hardback UK passport incorporating the existing pages of national identification. [102915]
§ Mrs. RocheThere are no plans to introduce a new hardback United Kingdom passport. The burgundy style soft covered passport, introduced in 1988, is machine-readable and in a common format agreed in 1981 with other European Union countries. It also complies with international practice, in particular the International Standards and Recommended Practices of the International Civil Aviation Organisation Convention on International Civil Aviation. Most countries of the world produce passports with a flexible soft cover. The standard format for passports facilitates the passage of many millions of travellers worldwide, enabling speedier progress through passport controls.
Moreover, it would not now be practical to produce a hardback version of the United Kingdom passport. In 1997 the United Kingdom Passport Agency let a 10-year contract for the Security Printing and Systems Ltd. for a more secure version of the soft covered machine readable passport. It would require substantial and expensive re-engineering of the passport manufacturing process to switch to a hardback cover.