By Steve Ranger, 24 July 2006 14:50
NEWS
The cost of high-tech security will push the price of a passport up by more that 50 per cent in a year.
The government has revealed that the price of a passport is to rise again - by almost a third - to cover the cost of new security measures including biometrics.
A standard passport currently costs £51 but this will rise to £66 - an increase of 29 per cent - while the price of a child passport will rise from £34 to £45.
The price rise, which is effective from 5 October, is the second fee hike in a year to cover the cost of improved security and background checks.
Prices rose in December last year, pushing the cost of a passport up from £42 to £51, which means the travel documents have seen their cost rocket 57 per cent since the project to improve security started.
Want more on biometrics?
ePassports aren't the only place that biometrics are being used. Read silicon.com's A to Z of biometrics to find out more about iris scans, palm prints and ID cards.
Home Office minister Joan Ryan said the cost of security "is a price that must be paid" to protect the integrity of UK travel documents.
One million biometric ePassports have been issued since March when the new style travel documents were launched.
Each passport contains a chip which stores a scan of the holder's passport photo, to increase security and comply with international standards.
The scans will be used to check passport applications against a database of known passport fraudsters.
From the end of August all UK passport applicants will receive the new-style passport when they next apply for or renew their passport.
Failure to have an ePassports programme in place before October would have had direct consequences for travellers. For example, because of US Visa Waiver rules, had the ePassport been unavailable hundreds of thousands of holiday makers would have had to pay for visas to visit the US.
There are currently around 47 million UK passports in circulation. Around 80 per cent of the population holds a passport - a big jump on the 24 per cent in 1984.
Comments
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1. Guy Herbert
Except the chips are cheap as chips.
What's expensive is the bullying bureaucracy and the intrusive background checking and data-sharing that are being introduced in parallel, hiding behind changes to the document itself. All of which are unnecessary to the security of the document (and may even weaken it), but desirable to the UK government for other reasons: to begin the building of a population surveillance register, and nationalized identity management system.
2. anonymous
At this rate, £300 with a full 'ID' card will be a price reduction.
See the Government have learned something from the commercial industries -
Put your prices up, then have a 25% off sale - Just like ASDA, Tesco etc.