As a tender writer myself, I can only tell you that the manufacture of the British passports went out to tender (according to EU & WTO procurement rules) and Gemalto submitted the Most Economically Advantageous Tender... the end
If the British company, De La Rue, had submitted a better tender, deemed to be the Most Economically Advantageous Tender, they would have won the contract. They did not. That's all.
This was a free and fair competition conducted under well established procurement rules which work to the advantage of the government as it seeks the most cost effective way of getting the passports made.
When eurosceptics who have long championed the slogan "global Britain" call a foreign company making our passports a "national humiliation" I can only think they 1. Don't know what "global Britain" really means and/or 2. Are not very sincere when they call for us to "go global"
What advantage would there be in ensuring a state monopoly on passport manufacture? Who has a national identity to fragile that they consider this a humiliation? Ludicrous
We will almost certainly look to retain said procurement rules in a future trade agreement - and WTO Government Procurement Agreement will apply anyway - because they benefit British business & government.
The alternative is having a government agency produce passports like the French.... but why? Why waste money for a misguided sense of fragile national identity? IN any case, I thought we were going global? We don't want to be protectionist do we? That isn't "global Britain"
unroll @threadreaderapp
