Joanna Cherry
Main Page: Joanna Cherry (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh South West)Department Debates - View all Joanna Cherry's debates with the Home Office
(6 years, 8 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
I am sure that everything in North East Somerset is of the very highest quality, and often rather refined.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
The Scottish National party sympathises with the workers whose jobs are threatened by this decision but, to be frank, the issue of where the new United Kingdom passport is printed as a result of the Government’s handling of Brexit is the least of our worries. Getting a dark blue passport—as the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) said, we could have had one all along, had we wanted it—will be little consolation for the loss of our EU rights, including the right to travel freely for work, study or pleasure, the right to free healthcare, and the rights protected by EU law and the Court of Justice. What benefits will we get from the dark blue passport to outweigh these losses? How many British citizens lucky enough to have a parent from another EU member state are, like me and many of my constituents, applying for an Irish, French or German passport so that they can hang on to those EU rights?
Caroline Nokes
The hon. and learned Lady appears to have focused on the colour of the passport and Brexit rather than the issue at hand: the need to obtain the best possible value for money in the new passport contract, and also to ensure that whatever the outcome of Brexit, we have one of the most secure travel documents in the world, with a range of innovative features.