ITV and others reported a 50% chance of a timely renewal, but the evidence is weak

13 May 2022 | Full Fact's weekly news
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FACT CHECK
No hard evidence behind passport renewal claim

ITV reported that holidaymakers have an estimated 50% chance of getting their passport renewed in a “successful and timely manner”. This figure, which isn’t based on statistical evidence, was also reported by a number of other outlets including LBC, The Mirror and the Daily Star.

The estimate comes from the Centre for Economics and Business Research (Cebr). We asked them a number of times about how the figure was calculated. They described it as an “assumption” which was “made for illustrative purposes”. This does not appear to have been reflected in the media coverage of its report, much of which was headlined on the 50% figure.

Cebr also told us that its assumption that passport renewal waiting times had increased to the extent that holidays are being cancelled was based on “anecdotal evidence” from press reports and Parliament. This isn’t a reliable way to arrive at a figure with any certainty.

There’s no doubt that some holidaymakers have been facing delays with passport renewals recently, with several MPs speaking in Parliament about constituents losing money after being forced to cancel travel plans because their passports were not returned in time.

We don’t have an alternative estimate for the proportion of holidaymakers who may not receive their passport back in time for their holiday, so it’s hard to tell how accurate the Cebr figure may be.

But according to the Home Office, 90% of passport applications completed between January and March this year were processed within six weeks—four weeks less than the 10 weeks which the government now recommends people allow for when applying to renew their passport.
Passport advice ([link removed])

CORRECTIONS
We deserve honesty in politics

“If a member is inaccurate by mistake, they should correct that mistake as soon as possible.”

The Speaker of the House opened Parliament this week with a warning to MPs about inaccuracy. Yet it's been 170 days since the Prime Minister first made a false claim about employment ([link removed]) and he still hasn't corrected the record.

This problem is not unique to the Prime Minister.

Here’s a list of politicians who we’ve identified as having made false or misleading claims in 2022 and not corrected the record:

Edward Argar, Scott Benton, Suella Braverman, Rob Butler, Christopher Chope, Thérèse Coffey, David Davis, Nadine Dorries, Michael Gove, Andrew Gwynne, Sajid Javid, Boris Johnson, Peter Kyle, Shabana Mahmood, Jerome Mayhew, Stephen McPartland, Stephen Morgan, Bridget Phillipson, Angela Rayner, Jacob Rees-Mogg, Rachel Reeves, Lee Rowley, Tulip Siddiq, Paul Scully, Bob Seely, Henry Smith, Mark Spencer, Keir Starmer and Beth Winter.

The current system for corrections isn’t working. If you agree we need to change this, join 25,000 others who have signed our petition and demand honesty in politics:

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FACT CHECK
Reports that 'most teachers' are suffering from depression are based on a self-selecting survey ([link removed])

A Press Association article published by the Independent and many local newspapers reports details from a survey on depression that may not be representative.

The data was collected by the teaching union NASUWT, who emailed 300,000 members, receiving 12,000 responses. Because this was based on the answers of those who chose to respond, the results may suffer from self-selection bias.

The union told us the results of the survey found the median result was a 38 on the Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale (WEMWBS). This scale is used to measure levels of wellbeing, and a result of 38 would indicate “probable clinical depression.”

But teachers who actively chose to take part in a survey about wellbeing may have levels of wellbeing that aren’t representative of teachers in general. So is there a more representative survey we can look at?
Last summer, YouGov conducted a survey of education staff for the charity Education Support. This survey used a method more likely to make it representative, and found that school teachers had an average WEMWBS score of 43.7. That’s down from 45.5 in 2020.

This is significantly higher than the data from the teachers’ union, but an individual score of 43.7 would still be “indicative of possible/mild depression”.

The NHS’s most recent report on this found adults in England had a median score of 51.0 - which is quite a lot higher than the averages for teachers mentioned above.

There is some other evidence that teachers have worse mental health than people in other jobs. Data from the Labour Force Survey suggested that “teaching and other educational professionals” in Great Britain were among those with statistically higher rates of “work-related stress, depression or anxiety” when averaging data from 2018/19 to 2020/21.
Teachers and depression ([link removed])
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