(2) how far away, in miles, from Grimsby the nearest passport application office will be following the planned opening of new offices.
The proposed locations for the 69 interview offices are included in the following list.
The passport interview network will provide an office within 15 minutes travelling time for just over half of the population of the UK and over 95 per cent. of the population will live within one hour's travelling of an office.
A small number of potential applicants, estimated to be less than 0.7 per cent. of first-time passport applicants (4,000 out of 600,000 per annum), live more than an hour's journey from an interview office. For this group we are putting in place secure video-conferencing links with the customer visiting a partner organisation, for example, local council premises. We currently plan to have remote interview facilities in 25 locations; however we are still consulting with regional stakeholders and are considering additional locations.
We have placed a document in the Library of the House of Commons setting out the planned network.
To provide an analysis of the population within a 20-mile radius of each of the 69 interview offices would incur a disproportionate cost. The interview office closest to Grimsby will be in Kingston-upon-Hull, a distance of approximately 33 miles.
Proposed locations for the 69 passport interview offices
Aberdeen
Dundee
Edinburgh
Glasgow
Inverness
Kilmarnock
Oban
Stirling
Wick
Berwick-upon-Tweed
Carlisle
Dumfries
Galashiels
Kendal
Middlesbrough
Newcastle
Northallerton
Armagh
Belfast
Coleraine
Omagh
Blackburn
Liverpool
Manchester
Wrexham
Hull
Leeds
Scarborough
Sheffield
York
Aberystwyth
Bristol
Cheltenham
Newport
Swansea
Swindon
Birmingham
Derby
Leicester
Northampton
Shrewsbury
Stoke-on-Trent
Warwick
Boston
Bury St. Edmunds
Ipswich
Kings Lynn
Lincoln
Norwich
Peterborough
Barnstaple
Camborne
Exeter
Plymouth
St Austell
Yeovil
Andover
Bournemouth
Newport IOW
Oxford
Portsmouth
Reading
Chelmsford
Crawley
Dover
Hastings
London
Luton
Maidstone