Steep passport price hike for British expats
For British citizens living abroad, the price of a passport will rise to £119 from 1 April (about €176 or US$ 223.40 at today’s rates). With a few months' delay, passport charges to British expats are following those applied within the UK itself. The steep increase will help to pay for interrogations, ID cards, fingerprinting and a new, intrusive database, the National Identity Register, which will build up an "audit trail" of each citizen's ID use. British passports will now be among the most expensive in the world.
More details can be found in our press release.
New resources available
In the Resources list on the side of this page you can find the latest versions of the passport renewal factsheet for expats. The factsheet is available in long and short versions, and is provided both in Microsoft Word and PDF format.
There is also an A4 noticeboard poster that you can put up where other expats are likely to see it, and NO2ID Expats logo images for anyone who wants to put together their own publicity material.
26th March - ID Day Action
On the 26th March 2007 ("ID Day") NO2ID is organising a day of protests against the introduction of UK ID cards and the National Identity Register. This date is likely to coincide with the opening of the first ID interrogation centres in the UK.
Since the Foreign and Commonwealth Office is both the contact point for British citizens living outside the UK and is also our passport issuing authority we plan to let them know that this scheme is also a matter of concern to us.
Please take a few minutes on the 26th March to send a message to the FCO to let them know your concerns. You can do this using the online feedback form on the FCO website. If you wish, you can copy the following message and paste it into the FCO feedback form, but please feel free to write your own words (this is likely to be more effective). Please try to remain polite however strongly you may feel about this issue.
As a British citizen currently resident outside the UK, I have many reservations and concerns about the introduction of the UK National Identity Register and ID card scheme.
Given the linkage made by the government between the ID scheme and entitlement to British passports, for which the FCO is the responsible issuing authority in my case, I ask for your assurance that I will not be subject to interrogation nor to fingerprinting or iris-scanning at a British consulate or embassy when the time comes for me to renew my passport. Such an interrogating role for consulates and embassies would inevitably damage their relationship with British citizens living abroad.
At the same time, I seek your assurance that interrogation, fingerprinting and/or iris-scanning of British citizens abroad will not be subcontracted to private firms, whether British or local, as this would clearly raise data security risks even greater than those already created by the proposed scheme.
I further urge you to ensure that the British government does not proceed with its proposal to interrogate and fingerprint foreign nationals living in the UK, as this will cause further damage to our country's reputation and could lead to retaliatory action against British nationals living abroad,
The proposed National Identity Scheme is poorly designed, insecure and expensive. It will not only be very intrusive and dangerous for individuals but will dramatically change the balance of power between citizen and state that has formed the basis of stable democracy in the UK for centuries. As such I strongly urge you to use your good offices to ensure that the National Identity Register and ID card scheme proposed by the present British government do not come into effect.