If only we had the means to take back control:
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Hope they stamp the buggers “Made in the EU”
And held up at the border whilst the customs checks are being.
It seems we do have the means, as in a suitable manufacturer, but not the government will – which as ever looks for what I presume is at least on the face of it the cheapest option in the narrowest sense without thinking of the wider social / financial implications. France on the other hand cites security issues to ensure that their procurement stays within France. If only our Government wanted to support GB business.
Not quite right.
EU (and WTO) procurement rules say that if you call for a tender you´re not allowed to discriminate. In France a state owned company produces the passports. So the production happens “in house”. No tender needed. Not forbidden by the rules. Britain could do the same if they had a state owned company for that.
So Andy Crow is wrong too.
Nothing to do with “only the British follow the rules”. More to do with only the British have privatized everything.
I would have thought that under the EU procurement rules the UK will need to award contracts to the European firm that submits the best value tender until the end of the transition period.
How this will pan out remains to be seen, public sector building contracts run for extended periods of time and we may see contracts awarded under one tariff / tax regime having to be completed under another.
You are precisely right
But as the spokesman for the UK company which didn’t win the contract pointed out, France, for example, gets round this by claiming their passeports are a matter of national security and not up for tender under competition rules.
It’s this sort of British anal attitude to following regulations that has checkered our relationship with the EU all along. The impression that ‘They’ do what they please while ‘We’ observe the rules is not entirely a media fiction.
Pink passports and inflexible procurement rules are a bit like bent bananas.
We could, if we really wanted to, have had blue passports all along. And made sure that they were manufactured in the UK.
Where in the Public Procurement Regs requires a UK contracting authority to only entertain bids from European companies?
As I understand it, a UK contracting authority is not obliged to recognise qualifications from non-EU countries.
But otherwise, if a bidder from a non-EU country bids, it is entitled to equal treatment, transparency etc. like all other bidders – and for its bid to be judged on its merits, with the expectation of a contract if it is the highest scoring bid.
I’ve searched the Regs but can’t find anything – would be grateful if a reader can point me in the right direction if I have missed something.
I think it would be a great step in the right direction for, say, an African country to win a contract of this kind on its merits. I’d hate to think they were excluded for simply being from, say, Kenya.
Should we laugh, or cry ?
Both Andy. Laugh at Brexiters foaming at the mouth as the stupidity of their whole project is revealed by reality, as opposed to their pathetic Britnat fantasies.
Weep at the fact that this nonsense is even going ahead.
Taking back control now means monies being distributed by ministers without the benefit of Parliamentary oversight. Read, weep: “Hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayer’s money will be spent setting up bodies to replace work done by the European Union, some using a Whitehall wheeze devised by a Treasury mandarin to get round scrutiny by MPs.” http://www.tribunemagazine.org/2018/03/tax-will-fund-post-eu-bodies-with-no-scrutiny-by-mps/ It must have been like this in the last days of Rome as, sensing the imminent demise of the entire system, everyone who could simply grabbed for themselves everything they could. The end is surely nigh…
“The former Cabinet minister Priti Patel dubbed it “a disgraceful decision” and “perverse”. it should be a moment that we should be celebrating. The return of our iconic blue passport will re-establish the British identity”.
An actual MP actually said this.
Our identity defined by the colour of our passport………..
Crass is to be too kind……
Been said before, but I’ll say it again: my old passport is black, or so dark a navy blue that it is effectively black. The new passport is, I suppose, the product of blue sky thinking. Or something. Anyway, seriously thinking of applying for the Italian passport to which I am entitled by descent. Do the Dutch print the Italian passports, does anyone know? Do I care?
Mike
We do have a number of high security printing operations in the UK. I look forward with interest to see how and why this procurement decision was reached. We are charged between about £72 and £95 for a passport and I doubt that the material and printing costs can amount to more than 10% of this so the production cost is not the major factor. It seems that a political factor has been introduced.
i know some of the people in Gemalto (who won the contract). The company has traditionally been very active in the area of smart cards – for decades – de la Rue, by contrast, is a bit of a later comer to ID documents and systems that incorporate ICs (such as the UK passport) and other forms of security. Of course the UK gov’ could have done what the French (and others do) & cited national security. That the Uk did not, says a great deal about the mind set of UK bureaucrats and or UK politicos – who seem to lack any understanding of how the real world works, outside of Westminster.
& for the avoidance of doubt – I would have been very happy to have seen de La Rue win the contract – even if the price was a bit higher.