Passport to hell

IT'S the strangest things which amuse me when I'm listening to the news on the radio - often the strangest people they dig up for vox pops.

Yesterday, 2,500 people from the Passport Agency went out on strike. On Monday, they go back to work and they've threatened that they will begin to 'work to rule.'

And we're supposed to notice the difference when? Have you ever been to a passport office and not ended up baffled by the rules which the workers there stick to like glue. Like the train staff I was telling you about, if you complain and they don't want to help, they sit back with a smug smile which says 'listen pal, you need me, or else you ain't going anywhere.'

Their strike is being described as 'being over pay' which is a bit misleading. It's not. It's about the fact a pay offer hasn't yet been tabled. It's not even as if a rise has been put on the table and they've rejected it.

Why is this happening? Is it, by chance, because the public sector is pretty much the only place where the unions can still flex what little muscle they have left? If that's the case, let's get privatising things like passports double-quick.

The PCS union boss Mark Serwotka said: "At the same time as the cost of a passport has risen by 50% many staff members have seen their pay rise below the cost of inflation at a rate of just 1%."

But you've had a pay rise, chaps, at a time when, given the way it's become nigh-on impossible to get a passport easily, most private companies would repay such a performance with a P45.

If they were walking out calling for more cash to get better staff to improve the service - perhaps there would be some support. But they're not.

Mr Serwotka's lot went on to boast that their action on Friday delayed the processing of 30,000 passports with 'most interviews' cancelled.

Well done. Tens of thousands of holidays potentially wrecked there. Hundreds, perhaps, of people who need to get overseas ASAP delayed. And they're proud of that fact. Proud of the fact that they're messing with people's lives because 'management haven't made a pay offer a priority.'

And what is they're priority. Well, the bosses say it's improving the service. For once, I think, the public will be on the side of management, and not the annoying dress-down, smoke-break-never-shorter-than-15-minutes, out-bang-on-time, can-i-have-an-ergonomic-assessment-of-my-desk-brigade. Don't expect too many honking horns in support, chaps.