As delays continue for Canadaian’s to receive their passports, Skeena-Bulkley Valley MP Taylor Bachrach is calling on the federal government to open a passport office for the North.
In a letter penned to Minister of Families, Children and Social Development Karina Gould, he highlighted the impacts the passport delays have had on residents.
Currently, there is no passport office in the Northern part of the province that provides urgent processing.
Bachrach said the closest where this service is available is in Vancouver or Victoria.
“What we’ve seen over the past couple of months has been so frustrating for so many people and frankly it’s unacceptable. We need the government to act in a much more concerted way and part of that is ensuring that people in rural areas have access to passport services,” he said.
Bachrach added that there also needs to be more staff hired to help with the demand.
He also said that he has heard from residents within the region that they are struggling to get their passports in a timely way.
“We need to ensure that people don’t incur thousands of dollars in expense to drive or fly all the way to Vancouver or Victoria to pick up their passports, that’s absolutely horrendous and absolutely unacceptable,” Bachrach said.
He added that the government should have anticipated the demand for passports to increase as restrictions were suspended.
Earlier this week, the Federal Government announced that four new passport sites were created but there was not one in British Columbia.