Thomas Greig warned the Commons home affairs committee on Wednesday (20 July) that delays processing passport applications could continue over the summer and may not improve before the end of the year.

According to Sky News, which reported Greig’s comments to the committee, it is currently taking around 10 weeks to process 10% of applications instead of the standard three weeks.

When pressed on when he felt the situation would improve, and if wait times would return to normal levels by the end of the year, Greig said: "I don’t think I can guarantee that."

He added demand for new passports had fallen "significantly" in the past few weeks.

Chair of the committee, Diana Johnson, said it was "completely unacceptable" people were struggling to get their passports, according to the Sky News report.

"This is not rocket science," she said. "It just seems to me this is a complete failure if you were looking at this from last July, and we’re still now, 12 months on, with all these people not being able to get their passports."