Are British Blue passports issued yet in UK?

[NanLaew]

4 hours ago, ChipButty said:

I remember the days when you could just walk into the embassy in Bangkok and get a new passport after 3 days

And what did you do in the evenings?

[Kwasaki]

4 minutes ago, NanLaew said:

And make sure you enjoy your visaless European travel while you still can.

Wouldn't go there if you paid me, good riddance. 

[Kwasaki]

15 hours ago, Pattaya46 said:

UK can choose any color for its passport now that it left EU... 

exactly as UK could have chose any color (this blue color?) while it was still in EU... 

Brexit was not needed for that...

Well maybe it's because I'm conservative. 

[Kwasaki]

16 hours ago, tribalfusion001 said:

Whatever floats your boat, it's just a passport.

Just glad it floated in effect July 31st it only took 4 months. 

[GroveHillWanderer]

6 hours ago, CorpusChristie said:

No, due to E.U rules, the UK Gov were not told which Country the applications came from .

All the bids were anonymous and the UK Gov were not allowed to favour a UK Company  

As far as I'm aware that's just not true. EU procurement regulations specifically allow for negotiations between the contracting authority and the bidders. You can't hold negotiations with a bidder if you don't know who they are. See extract below form the EU procurement policy.

 

Quote

Negotiations should aim at improving the tenders so as to allow contracting authorities to buy works, supplies and services perfectly adapted to their specific needs. Negotiations may concern all characteristics of the purchased works, supplies and services including, for instance, quality, quantities, commercial clauses as well as social, environmental and innovative aspects, in so far as they do not constitute minimum requirements.

 

In any event, the contract was only required to be opened up to bidders from other countries because the UK decided to make it an open procurement tender, which they didn't have to do.

 

As was pointed out in many UK newspapers at the time, French passports are made by Imprimerie Nationale, the state-run French printing organisation, because the French government decided not to put the job out to tender, as allowed under EU rules.

 

You can't blame EU rules for the contract being awarded to a French firm when EU rules would have allowed the UK to award the contract to a British firm if they'd just chosen a different procurement method.

[CorpusChristie]

5 minutes ago, GroveHillWanderer said:

As far as I'm aware that's just not true. EU procurement regulations specifically allow for negotiations between the contracting authority and the bidders. You can't hold negotiations with a bidder if you don't know who they are. See extract below form the EU procurement policy.

 

 

In any event, the contract was only required to be opened up to bidders from other countries because the UK decided to make it an open procurement tender, which they didn't have to do.

 

As was pointed out in many UK newspapers at the time, French passports are made by Imprimerie Nationale, the state-run French printing organisation, because the French government decided not to put the job out to tender, as allowed under EU rules.

 

You can't blame EU rules for the contract being awarded to a French firm when EU rules would have allowed the UK to award the contract to a British firm if they'd just chosen a different procurement method.

"EU procurement rules, which the UK had to obey until Brexit was done, prevented ministers from discriminating against European firms bidding for public contracts.

The decision was therefore a result of a blind tender meaning that ministers were not allowed to know which firm had submitted which bid."

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1245892/brexit-news-blue-passport-poland-theresa-may-boris-johnson-priti-patel-spt

 

[GroveHillWanderer]

49 minutes ago, CorpusChristie said:

"EU procurement rules, which the UK had to obey until Brexit was done, prevented ministers from discriminating against European firms bidding for public contracts.

The decision was therefore a result of a blind tender meaning that ministers were not allowed to know which firm had submitted which bid."

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1245892/brexit-news-blue-passport-poland-theresa-may-boris-johnson-priti-patel-spt

 

Again, even if it was a blind tender, that's only because UK government chose that  particular procurement process. Under EU rules they could have done as the French government does and chosen a process whereby the passports were printed in the UK.

[ukrules]

18 hours ago, uncleP said:

But they are made in France lol

We like to used cheap skilled labour wherever we can find it ????

[CorpusChristie]

40 minutes ago, GroveHillWanderer said:

Again, even if it was a blind tender, that's only because UK government chose that  particular procurement process. Under EU rules they could have done as the French government does and chosen a process whereby the passports were printed in the UK.

No, the UK followed EU rules which is a requirement .

(I have no idea about French passports and cant be bothered to do any research)

[ubonjoe]

A off topic post and reply to it has been removed.

[lungbing]

9 hours ago, CorpusChristie said:

Its not difficult to get to BKK/CM from anywhere in Thailand , plenty of flights , buses and trains running regularly and cheaply and you only have to make the journey twice every ten years .

  Not such a difficult thing to do , would you like the UK Ambassador to personally come and visit you are give you a new passport ?

Why not, he seems to have nothing else to do.

[OJAS]

 

10 hours ago, CorpusChristie said:

Its not difficult to get to BKK/CM from anywhere in Thailand , plenty of flights , buses and trains running regularly and cheaply and you only have to make the journey twice every ten years .

  Not such a difficult thing to do , would you like the UK Ambassador to personally come and visit you are give you a new passport ?

"Its not difficult to get to BKK/CM from anywhere in Thailand , plenty of flights , buses and trains running regularly and cheaply"

 

You're living in cloud cuckoo land if you really seriously believe that. There are no flights or trains running with any semblance of regularity - or, indeed, at all - to BKK or CM from my neck of the woods, thank you very much. Only the occasional clapped-out and usually manically-driven coach or minibus taking forever and a day.

 

And neither am I expecting a personal visit from the Ambassador with my new passport. All I ask is that HMPO put my address - and not VFS's - on the DHL envelope containing my new passport, as they did up until 2014. And that's after I'd either posted my renewal application direct to their Liverpool office - or, even better, applied through their online service which we're denied the use of from Thailand for some ridiculous reason.

 

What's so unreasonable in your eyes about these modest requests?

Edited July 28, 2020 by OJAS

[CorpusChristie]

4 minutes ago, OJAS said:

 

"Its not difficult to get to BKK/CM from anywhere in Thailand , plenty of flights , buses and trains running regularly and cheaply"

 

You're living in cloud cuckoo land if you really seriously believe that. There are no flights or trains running with regularity - or, indeed, at all - to BKK or CM from my neck of the woods, thank you very much. Only the occasional clapped-out, manically-driven coach or minibus taking forever and a day.

 

And neither am I asking for personal visit from the Ambassador with my new passport. Only that HMPO put my address - and not VFS's - on the DHL envelope containing my new passport, as they did up until 2014. And that's after I'd either posted my renewal application direct to their Liverpool office - or, even better, applied through their online service which we're denied the use of from Thailand for some ridiculous reason.

 

What's so unreasonable in your eyes about these modest requests?

Because you have to hand over your old passport when you collect your new one , so they can invalidate your old passport , thats why you have to go to an office to collect your PP