Thread by @PickardJE

Seaborne Freight won’t have its new Ramsgate-Ostend service ready before April, several weeks after Brexit day, officials admitted during a private cross-departmental meeting of Whitehall officials on Monday - story here on @FT
ft.com/content/743b11…

the company isn’t exactly denying this:

Meanwhile it seems the company might have issued “inaccurate investor briefings” last year.

A document entitled “Seaborne Freight (UK) Limited — Investor Briefing April 2018”, claimed the company had “detailed port agreements with both Ramsgate and Ostend negotiated and agreed”.

This wasn’t true.

Director Brian Raincock told me yesterday: “An agreement with Ostend is largely agreed and Ramsgate is nearing completion...They have been in negotiation for two years . . . Seaborne has never claimed to have signed contracts with Ramsgate or Ostend.”

Do I emailed him the investor presentation, which included these passages:

A little later a Seaborne employee emailed to say that the document was genuine. “I am confirming on the [sic] behalf of Brian that this is a Seaborne document.”

so why did Seaborne chief executive Ben Sharp tell my colleague @Petercampbell1 just before New Year that the contracts had been signed?
google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.ft.c…

I’ve been accidentally cc’d into a Raincock email today suggesting that “negotiated and agreed” is not the same as “signed”, fwiw

And now a new upbeat statement from Seaborne: “We are now in the final phase of the project and we are approaching the point of signature with Ramsgate and Ostend, with services due to commence in March.”

Labour has submitted written question:

“To ask SoS for Transport what plans he has to cancel the Department's contract with Seaborne Freight given that the terms of the contract specify a delivery date of 29 March 2019...deviation from this would constitute automatic default?”