Exclusive: Companies are turning to cheap EU labour to fill in Brexit red tape, due to a shortage of workers in the U.K. 1/ bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
Reminder: hundreds of millions of customs declarations will apply to U.K.-EU trade after Brexit, even if there's an FTA. It's a consequence of leaving the EU's customs union. The docs cost between ~£35-£60 each, with an estimated total annual cost of ~£13 billion 2/
There is a shortage in Britain of trained customs staff to handle the paperwork, and the virus has hampered efforts to recruit more 3/ bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
So what are companies doing? Hiring abroad. Xpediator, a group of freight forwarding firms, is recruiting staff in Romania to handle the paperwork. The labour is cheaper, and Romania has a deep pool of customs expertise having only joined the EU in 2007 4/
Another case, this time further afield. Metro Shipping in Birmingham, which moves goods for FTSE 100 firms, is hiring staff in India to do the work. `There’s nowhere near enough skill-set here to cover it,' said biz dev. director Grant Liddell 5/
The customs agent shortage is one of the main Brexit risks as the end of transition nears. If companies haven't filled in the red tape, there goods will get stopped at the border. That's why there are concerns of 7,000-truck-long queues into Dover 6/
How is the government doing on fixing the problem? They've made £84m available in grants for customs training.. but less than 30% of that has actually been paid out to firms. And Michael Gove repeatedly declines to say how many agents have been trained 7/
Working in customs is one of the genuine money-making opportunities of Brexit. But even here, the jobs are starting to go to eastern Europeans and non-Brits... ends/ bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
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Strong question from @hilarybennmp to Michael Gove on Brexit: food supplies in NI threatened, border prep `frankly pathetic' per hauliers, IT systems won't be ready. Why is he optimistic, when others aren't?
Gove: I'm meeting businesses, there are challenges but opportunities 1/
Benn's question referenced the situation in Northern Ireland, where industry say changes to the Customs Declaration Service have come too late, and new software won't be delivered 2/
With ~35 working days until Brexit hits for real, a thread about the new IT systems... 1/
A House of Lords committee has just heard stark evidence from industry that critical systems won't be ready on Jan. 1, especially the customs system for Northern Ireland, known as CDS (Customs Declaration Service) 2/
Steve Bartlett, head of the Association of Freight Software Suppliers, says they haven't been able to do testing, there are grave reservations, they've simply run out of time 3/ bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
Scoop: British bike makers face a wave of cheap Chinese imports after Brexit, as EU anti-dumping rules are dropped by the U.K. 1/ bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
Brompton Bicycles is among the companies in the firing line, as DIT has decided not to maintain the EU's tariffs of up to 48.5% on bikes coming in from China. The levy was introduced in response to large state support by China to its manufacturers 2/ eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/…
Post-Brexit, the UK has control of its trade defence policy. It says it will only maintain EU anti-dumping rules if domestic producers make up more than 1% of the local market for a good. They say British bikes failed on this metric 3/ gov.uk/guidance/trade…
(Caveat: these benefits sit alongside an array of negative consequences in the form of worse access and higher costs of doing business with the EU. But if you follow @Brexit, you knew that already. So let's focus on potential positives...) 2/
(Also: it would be helpful if the govt did a better job of pointing out concrete, real-world examples of Brexit gains that go beyond rhetorical flourishes and are undisputed wins only possible outside the EU. This took a fair amount of leg work. End of preamble!) 3/
Exclusive: Key software to keep goods moving after Brexit won't be ready in time, developers warn 1/ bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
The Association of Freight Software Suppliers, whose members connect businesses to the government's customs systems, says they haven't been given enough time and information to develop their IT products. They're urging HMRC to ready contingency plans 2/
And even if they did have the information, AFSS says it'd be too late to train businesses on the software. Plus many companies put a freeze on installing new systems in December and January anyway, the group says 3/
The basics: goods moving GB to NI will need new paperwork. This is because the UK agreed to uphold the integrity of the EU customs territory, and didn't want a border on the island of Ireland. This is the govt's own guidance on the NI protocol 2/ gov.uk/government/pub…
And the government has kindly thrown money at the issue, in a bid to help companies. It'd be strange to spend money on processes that don't exist 3/ bloomberg.com/news/articles/…