19:08 25 February 2020
New British passports to be produced in Poland
New British passports will be produced by the French-Dutch company Thales with a factory in Poland because the British company De La Rue has lost the tender, as The Times daily reported. The 11-year contract is worth £260 million. The international Thales group has a factory in Tczew.
According to The Times, passports’ colors - blue combined with gold - are to refer to English passports from before 1988 and symbolically support the creation of a new British national identity after Brexit. For the same reason, the cover also includes floral emblems of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.
Meanwhile, the British company De La Rue, which produced British passports when the country was part of the European Union, had to face the consequences of not renewing that contract. This threatened the loss of 200 jobs in the company, and efforts to renew the old contract cost De La Rue £4 million.
That is why the final decision of the British government to sign the contract with the foreign Thales group caused controversy.
(300gospodarka)
