The waiting times for passports have decreased – but now the union testifies that there is still a lot of pressure on the passport offices. – If someone is away from us, then we don’t have anyone to take in, but then we are in the red. If we don’t get more colleagues… we can’t have it like this for another summer, says passport officer Charlotte Österlind. To meet the demand, the staff is still working double shifts since last spring. Overtime has almost increased tenfold compared to last year and the number of reported work injuries has also increased. In May, the government decided to lower the fee for a national ID card from SEK 400 to SEK 100 for those who did not apply for a passport at the same time. The aim was to reduce the waiting time – but it had the opposite effect, according to the administrators. – I know that they are recruiting, but I don’t feel that it is happening at the pace that we would need to have employees on site, says Ann Gustafsson, vice union president ST Polisen. In the player above: The police chief of staff respond to the criticism.
t4-general
Staff alert: The passport chaos continues
