Ms Fiona Penollar:

I will start with turnarounds. On a weekly basis, we have updates on our website on exactly where we are on turnaround times so people know before they choose a channel which one to go down. It is a lot harder for us when someone is in the Passport Express system. On one of our busiest days in May alone we received 10,000 applications. The Deputy can imagine the difficulty we would have extracting one application from 10,000 applications. The challenge for us is that when we extract an application from Passport Express it has a natural knock-on effect on other people who may not have contacted us because they understood their application would be processed within a certain time. If we extract applications, other people will be affected so it is very much a balancing act.

The turnaround times shown on the website are live and valid. Today on the website the turnaround time for first-time, lost or stolen applicants is 33 days for the first time this year and it is 15 days for renewals. The actual turnaround time is 14 days for renewals and 31 days for the others, but we like to give a buffer as it gives us a bit of flexibility.