No-deal plan offers alternatives to Dover
MINISTERS have drawn up plans to redirect food exports to Belgian and Dutch ports if the French government impose new checks that clog up traffic to Calais in the event of a no-deal Brexit.
Lorries destined for ferries departing from Dover will be sent instead to ports along the east coast, from where they will be loaded on to boats headed for Belgium and the Netherlands, rather than wait in emergency lorry parks on the M20 and M26 motorways in Kent.
The plans are intended to ensure British firms’ exports of perishable goods and “strategic” products, such as military and communications equipment, can continue unhindered.
But today a senior member of the European Research Group of Eurosceptic Conservative backbenchers insists European ports would not impose new checks that would hold up freight because to do so would “directly damage their own agricultural, pharmaceutical and manufacturing industries”.
Writing for The Telegraph website, Sir Bernard Jenkin, the chairman of the group’s steering committee, adds: “If European governments were to cause hold-ups, they will be causing the chaos. From the perspective of their own businesses and citizens, who would they blame? The French farmers would be rioting. This just will not happen.”
In May, the Government outlined plans to introduce a new queuing system on the M20, in order to allow lorries to park while waiting to cross the Channel, without blocking the road to other traffic.
It came after queues of 4,600 lorries stretched back 30 miles in 2015 as a result of a strike by French ferry workers.
The Government’s contingency plans include proposals to set aside the coastbound side of the M20 for queu- ing lorries, and to effectively create a dual carriageway on the northbound side, to allow traffic to continue travelling in both directions. Ministers have said they were working to prevent “sixmile queues at Dover” after Brexit.
Today, The Sunday Telegraph can disclose that their plans include lining up alternatives to the ferry route from Dover to Calais, in order to give firms the option of diverting to other destinations along the EU coastline rather than stacking their lorries in Kent.
In his article, Sir Bernard claims that while it is “good to plan for worst case scenarios” many of the warnings about the consequences of a no-deal Brexit are “just part of the campaign to frighten MPs into keeping the UK tied to the EU, or stopping Brexit altogether.”
He adds: “The ‘no-deal’ disruption scenario is based on a central absurd assumption: that Calais and the other EU ports will be choked and paralysed by new, lengthy and permanent customs checks, regardless of the consequences for businesses and livelihoods, or whether they are necessary or legal.”
In an interview with The Sunday Times Liam Fox has put the chances of a no-deal departure from the EU at “6040”, blaming the “intransigence” of the European Commission.
The Trade Secretary said he had previously thought the prospects of a no-deal Brexit to be “more than 50-50” but that the risk of a no trade deal had increased.
He added that if the EU did not like the current offer it was up to them to suggest one that would be acceptable.