Thread by @pmdfoster

NEW/EXC. Back in real world. The UK is nowhere close to meeting the target for 50,000 customs agents it needs for #Brexit, and the govt. "misleading" about it - haulage, customs chiefs tell me. Stay with me briefly. It's mad. /1Thread

ft.com/content/be64c4…

The need for 50,000 officers is an industry estimate, but one recognised repeatedly by @michaelgove in Parliament. Here is @hilarybennmp asking Gove about it at Select Commitee on April 27 - he doesn't dispute the figure. /2

committees.parliament.uk/committee/366/…

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp Why do we need so many? Well exact volumes are had to predict (because no data since we've not been doing customs with EU) but @NAOorguk estimate is an additional 200m declarations, with 140,000+ companies doing it for first time. /3 nao.org.uk/report/the-cus…

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk So how many of the additional 50,000 customs agents have been trained?

Hard to know exactly, but Robert Keen @BIFA_DG the head of Bifa, the UK's main trainer of customs agents wrote to @hilarybennmp on April 11 to say he'd trained 1,298 last year! /4

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk @BIFA_DG Separately the new Online Customs Academy set up last Sept with part of a £34m grant put aside by Govt for training has done 870 courses. I am told by @marco4gione that enrolment is 300% up this year - great, but we're still WAY short. /5

ukcustomsacademy.co.uk

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk @BIFA_DG @marco4gione .@michaelgove also said that he was in discussions with industry to build a new customs academy - apparently earmarked for Kent - but Mr Keen told Mr Benn as far as he knows it was just an "informal comment" /6

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk @BIFA_DG @marco4gione I asked @cabinetofficeuk for any info - funding, timelines, locations, investment and construction targets etc. They declined to produce any additional information, just this statement. /7

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk @BIFA_DG @marco4gione @cabinetofficeuk In his evidence to @hilarybennmp Mr Gove promised to update the committee with "the uptake and the additional number" of customs agents trained. As of last Friday, nearly a month after giving evidence, am told Committee has no reply to its request for info. /8

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk @BIFA_DG @marco4gione @cabinetofficeuk .@HywelPlaidCymru Hywell Williams asked @Jesse_Norman the Financial Secretary to the Treasury a similar question. He got no numbers either/9

parliament.uk/business/publi…

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk @BIFA_DG @marco4gione @cabinetofficeuk @HywelPlaidCymru @Jesse_Norman It takes a year to train a customs agent to the point where they can do routine forms - per @BIFA_DG Robert Keen. These forms are complex. And if you get them wrong, you cause delays - and cost and embarrassment to businesses/10

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk @BIFA_DG @marco4gione @cabinetofficeuk @HywelPlaidCymru @Jesse_Norman You'll have spotted the gap there. It's six months to Brexit day, more or less, so we don't have a year. Nor are we close to training 50,000 additional officers. Which is industry is starting to complain/warn of the trouble ahead. /11

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk @BIFA_DG @marco4gione @cabinetofficeuk @HywelPlaidCymru @Jesse_Norman Here's what Road Haulage Association boss Richard Burnett said @RHARichardB - "impossible" and Shane Brennan boss of Cold Chain Federation @ColdChainShane told me, citing "wilful ignorance" of politicians. /12

@michaelgove @hilarybennmp @NAOorguk @BIFA_DG @marco4gione @cabinetofficeuk @HywelPlaidCymru @Jesse_Norman @RHARichardB @ColdChainShane Mr Keen warns @hilarybennmp of the "potentially misleading and ambiguous" comments being made by politicians on the state of readiness. /13

This is also all equally true of NI Protocol.

People who actually move stuff, genuinely worried about how it going to work. And desperately demanding clarity.

Capacity can't be built overnight. #Brexit ENDS