(Ottawa) The federal government on Tuesday claimed it had managed to clear a huge backlog of passport applications in the country: the minister in charge of the file estimated that 98% of late applications have now been processed.
Posted at 2:46pm Updated at 5:03pm
Laura Osman The Canadian Press
Last October, most new passport applications were processed on time, but thousands of Canadians who applied before that date still experienced excessive delays.
Those delays are finally coming to an end, Social Development Minister Karina Gould announced on Tuesday. “The backlog is almost gone,” she said at a press conference on the sidelines of the Liberal cabinet retreat in Hamilton, Ontario.
The COVID-19 pandemic had caused a nearly two-year hiatus in passport applications, but when Canadians began to travel again, that demand suddenly skyrocketed.
That surge has resulted in long lines at federal offices across the country — some alarmed travelers even slept outside a passport office last summer hoping to catch their plane on time.
PHOTO ALAIN ROBERGE, LA PRESS ARCHIVE
People waiting outside hoping to get their new passports, June 2022.
On the other hand, some people who applied last summer are only getting their passports today, Secretary Gould apologetically acknowledged on Tuesday.
There may be several reasons why some people are still waiting for their precious document, she said. For example, some applications are more complex due to issues such as joint custody of children, while others have been singled out for admissibility or integrity reasons.
“Canadians can be confident that as long as their application is in order, they will get their passports on time,” she said.
Reinforcements to stay
To make up the huge backlog, the federal government has nearly doubled the number of passport-processing staff since March, and officials have accumulated thousands of overtime hours.
New staff are also expected to stay on to handle future peak periods, Gould said Tuesday.
The minister also expects large numbers of Canadians to apply over the next few years as the very first passports issued in the summer of 2013 with a 10-year expiration date will have to be renewed from July next year.
Service Canada is expected to process up to 3.5 million passport applications in the current fiscal year, she said, double the number from last year. It is expected that over the next few years between three and five million requests will be made each year.
The good news, Ms Gould added, is that Service Canada is better able to handle this level of demand than it was last spring. Between 80% and 85% of applications submitted last year came from people who had never held a passport before, which took longer to process their files, the minister explained.
“However, what we are planning, particularly for this summer, is a higher level of contract renewals, which are much easier,” she told reporters in Hamilton.
Although passport offices are back to normal, Ms Gould still encourages travelers planning to travel to check their passport’s expiry date and apply as soon as possible to avoid delays.