British ports request £120m for ‘white elephant’ Brexit border posts
British ports are demanding £120m in compensation after being forced to invest millions in post-Brexit border control posts rendered “obsolete” by Keir Starmer’s new EU deal.
Monday’s UK-EU trade deal committed to removing border checks on plant, animal and food imports from the EU member states.
The deal was welcomed by the port industry, but it also means a hefty chunk of fee revenue that could have been used to cover the cost of setting up Brexit border infrastructure will be wiped out.
“This agreement means that many new border control posts that were built at a cost of over £120m to industry to manage checks that never fully materialised are now likely to become obsolete,” Richard Ballantyne, chief executive of the British Ports Association (BPA), said.
“Government should cover the full costs of these white elephants and put this episode behind us.”
The government has been approached for comment.
Brexit border checks faced ‘significant issues’
The BPA represents more than 400 port facilities and terminals across the UK, many of which are owned by five major companies.
CK Hutchinson, which is owned by Hong Kong’s Li Ka-shing dynasty, recently sold the Port of Felixstowe as part of a wider transaction which roped in Blackrock and a subsidiary of the shipping giant MSC.
Dubai’s state-owned operator DP World runs London Gateway, which is in the midst an expansion that could see it become the UK’s largest.
Following yesterday’s deal, the BPA said it expected that “capital and operational costs (as well as opportunity costs) will likely never be recovered from traders as promised.”
Last year, the National Audit Office (NAO) estimated the government would spend more than £4.7bn on post-Brexit border controls over the course of their lifetime.
It added plans to bring in border checks had faced “significant issues” ahead of their implementation, including critical shortages of inspectors.