All of the staff have been subject to TUPE negotiations as a result of the Identity and Passport Services’ decision to award the 10-year contract to print the next generation of biometric passports to De La Rue rather than incumbent 3M.Countries often don't produce their own currency and passports -- they hire private firms to do it -- and for obvious reasons, countries don't like to talk about it.
The UK has decided to award its passport manufacturing contract to the home grown, though troubled, De La Rue rather than American firm 3M.
It's worth noting that the British passport is biometrically enabled (face recognition) and 3M recently completed its acquisition of biometrics firm Cogent, which had an application for face recognition for border control.
