Stephen Cadogan: Britain's plans to cope with Brexit have to be taken with a pinch of salt
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"After next October" has been confirmed as the latest deadline when the British government plans to start new sanitary and phytosanitary checks on goods arriving from the island of Ireland.
The checks include documentary, identity, and physical checks on medium-risk animals, plants, and their products, and the movement of existing inspections of high-risk plants and their products to border controls posts.
However, all British plans to cope with Brexit have to be taken with a pinch of salt, due to full controls having been postponed five times since the end of the EU exit transition period on December 31, 2020.
It is quite likely that the controls on goods arriving into Britain from the island of Ireland could be delayed again, because these goods usually arrive in Britain's west coast ports — which are the responsibility of devolved administrations in Scotland and Wales, rather than London.
The British government had not yet reached agreement with the devolved administrations on when to bring in checks on sanitary and phytosanitary goods from Ireland, nor on the level or nature of those checks.
The British government initially delayed import controls on goods moving into Britain from Ireland, because it wished to minimise disruption for traders while negotiations on the Northern Ireland Protocol were ongoing.
For example, the timetable will be affected while arrangements are put in place to deliver the government’s commitment of unfettered access for qualifying Northern Ireland goods going to Britain.
Goods from Ireland or the EU will be subject to customs and sanitary and phytosanitary controls on arrival in Britain, but those originating from Northern Ireland will not — regardless of route.
As set out in the Windsor Framework, businesses and citizens in Northern Ireland have the unique position (and opportunities) of full access to export to the EU market and also unfettered internal access to the UK market.
The British government originally intended to introduce a full import control regime on January 1, 2021, including customs and transit checks, inspections of animals, plants and their products; and safety and security declarations.
Delays and five postponements were needed to give businesses time to recover from covid-19, and the cost-of-living crisis.
However, a lack of clarity and integrated planning also led to delays, according to the National Audit Office in its latest report.
The National Audit Office independently scrutinises public spending for the British parliament. It has said the 2025 UK Border Strategy lacks a definitive timetable and a cohesive cross-government delivery plan.
The report says the total annual post-Brexit cost to British businesses of completing customs declarations on trade between the UK and the EU is £7.5bn.
There's hundreds of millions more to come in costs before a fully functioning border is in place, hopefully next October. After that, dealing with imports from Ireland will be the main task remaining.
Much government expenditure on infrastructure and staff has been wasted because of the repeated delays in introducing import controls. For example, the National Audit Office said port health authorities recruited about 520 staff to do SPS checks, but 370 of them were not required.
It also found that the loss of access to EU surveillance and alert systems reduces Britain’s awareness of impending dangers, and the phased approach to introducing full controls has increased biosecurity risk.
The National Farmers Union and British Poultry Council are concerned about the biosecurity risk.
There have been some high profile scares, such as nearly 100 tonnes of illegal meat imports being stopped at the Port of Dover.
Seizures included pork, which could expose the British livestock industry to devastating disease like African swine fever.
Another reported seizure by the Dover Port Health Authority had 54 unmarked sheep carcasses from two vehicles from Romania, which had travelled for several days in unhygienic conditions and unsuitable packaging. To guard against spread of disease, the meat from Romania was removed from the food supply chain.
The Dover staff said their inspection teams are fully committed to fighting off the threat of lethal diseases, but the new arrangement will be that high-risk meat shipments from all over the world will be allowed travel freely and uncontrolled, to self-present at the Sevington inspection facility 22 miles away.
The latest phase of checks on sanitary and phytosanitary goods came into force on April 30 last.
However, the National Audit Office said such controls may operate on an inconsistent and incomplete basis due to ongoing uncertainties and differences in port readiness.
There are concerns that trade flows will be diverted to the entry point of least resistance, until full border controls are in place.
Spelling out the enormity of the Brexit border task, the National Audit Office said £4.7bn (€5.5bn) is the government's forecast spending on the passage of goods across the border post-Brexit.
