EU border rules ‘threat’ to Dover, say MPS

New system at port would cause as much disruption as if France closed border, they warn

NEW EU rules would force lorry drivers and tourists to leave their vehicles for ID checks and prompt huge queues and traffic chaos, the Port of Dover warned yesterday.

The new system requires biometric checks and the use of electronic gates rather than the current simpler passport checks that can be carried out on people in their cars or lorries.

In a letter to the Government, Kent MPS warned there was a danger of “large scale traffic disruption in Kent … on a continual basis”.

The disruption would be as bad as if France closed the border, they said.

The EU’S Entry-exit-system, which is meant to monitor all non-eu travellers entering the bloc’s passport-free Schengen Area, is due to come into force in April next year.

It will require all non-eu citizens, such as Britons, to register a digital identification profile at checkpoints and undergo a biometric check. Dover will need new infrastructure to handle the border checks, which are carried out on UK territory by French police under a bilateral deal with Paris, port authorities have warned the Government.

There is at present no agreed system on how the checks could be carried out on people in vehicles, as they are currently for ferries from Dover or on the Channel Tunnel.

The Port of Dover, Getlink and the Logistics UK group have called on the Government to open talks with Brussels and Paris on how to avoid huge queues and smooth out the friction.

The impact of new post-brexit regulations posed “an imminent and serious threat” to the “well established frictionless and free flow operations” at Dover, they said.

“All effort must be devoted to maintaining these in the national economic interest.”

Dover alone is responsible for a third of all UK trade with the EU, which rises to 59 per cent if other routes in the region, such as the Tunnel, are taken into account.

The port processes £144billion of freight every year.

The disruption to supply chains would hit the motor industry, which is dependent on the most seamless supply chains possible, Dover, Getlink and Logistics UK told MPS and civil servants in London yesterday.

Delays at Dover, which runs ferries to Calais and Dunkirk roughly every 20 minutes, would also have a knock-on effect on EU imports into the UK because it would soak up freight capacity.

The Department of Transport has responded to the MPS’ letter. It said the Government would “work constructively” to “minimise checks” at the border.

How the border checks will be implemented in practice will be up to the French authorities, though they will have to take EU law into account.