Thread by @jl_owen

Dover District Council is the Port Health Authority responsible for Channel Tunnel and Port of Dover.

Any regulatory checks needed after Brexit will be conducted by them...

Report is concerning for few reasons...

https://twitter.com/faisalislam/status/1024228484191805441

Not only do they not seem to know what the plan is, they question whether Whitehall understands the constraints they face:

there have been no inspections since Single Market was created (c. 25yrs ago) and they don't even know what passes through the port as there's no data

This might be because govts view is that - in a no deal scenario - the UK would just waive all regulatory checks...

But sooner or later those checks would be needed... And Dover District Council are at the thick end.

Dover District Council - who don't know plan and don't think govt knows constaints - is ANOTHER PART OF GOVERNMENT.

Look how many are involved in the border in total.

But Government is just one player in the border process. Private sector is critical too.

From owners of ports to freight forwarders to traders.

While HMRC and Border Planning Group have done lots of good work in bringing these bits together and speaking to industry about options (under NDA).

The scale of the communication & preparedness task is massive: see instituteforgovernment.org.uk/publications/i…

But communications is hampered by politics - as we have seen again over last week or so with the technical notices.

The toxic interplay between politics and preparations is making an extraordinarily difficult task even harder

instituteforgovernment.org.uk/publications/p…