LONDON – At the ports and terminals on Britain’s south-east coast, a new era began on Friday morning without much ado. Ferries and trains carrying goods from Dover and Folkestone to France were running on time, and drivers were dragging their trucks to the port free of congestion.
It appears that little may have changed on January 1, the country’s first day outside the European Union’s single market and customs union. After all, it was a holiday and there wasn’t much business going on.
But, for the first time in more than 25 years, goods traveling between Britain and the European Union will no longer circulate freely and customs controls will be applied to goods entering the block.
A trade agreement, signed in Britain in the early hours of Thursday, less than 24 hours before it comes into force, means that the country and the European Union will market products without tariffs. Businesses, however, will still face significant changes for which they were urged to prepare, even during the blockades, closures and other social restrictions that the government introduced to contain a growing coronavirus pandemic.
The changes are bound to bring “difficult times”, a high-ranking minister predicted this week. The government expects that the new customs paperwork alone will cost British companies 7 billion pounds (about $ 9.6 billion) a year. The European Union is Britain’s largest trading partner, with £ 670 billion in imports and exports, and Britain imports far more products from the bloc than it exports. (It has a trade surplus in services, which is not covered by the trade agreement.)
Britain has at least 150,000 exporters who have never shipped their goods outside the bloc, according to data from the country’s tax agency, and therefore will need to make customs declarations for the first time. Border controls in the European Union were eliminated in 1993.
This is a change that will be felt immediately in the ports of Great Britain, especially in the busy port of Dover and in the Eurotunnel terminal in Folkestone, which connects the country to France. But on Friday, with most business interrupted for New Year’s Day, trains and ferries were working well. Eurotunnel reported that 200 trucks had used their transport train at 8 am, with all the correct documents.
“It looks very calm,” Elizabeth De Jong, director of policy for Logistics UK, a trade group, told Sky News on Friday morning.
But she added that companies now face “a new language and different from customs arrangements” that needs to be understood. She described the coming weeks as a live test, as companies must ensure they have the right paperwork for themselves and goods on board, and traffic must be managed in the area.
Away from the Dover-Calais intersection, there were some initial hiccups.
Six trucks bound for Ireland, a member of the European Union, were turned around to board a ferry at Holyhead, a port in Wales, according to Stena Line, a ferry operator. Drivers did not have the authorization now required for trucks crossing from Britain to Ireland – in this case, a digital “pre-shipment notification” from the Irish tax bureau.
The ferry company, seeing an opportunity in potential Brexit headaches, increased the number of direct trips it offers between Ireland and France, avoiding Britain and the need for customs controls.
In what the British government described as the worst case scenario, 40 to 70 percent of trucks heading for the European Union may not be ready for new border controls. This can lead to lines of up to 7,000 trucks heading to the border and delays of up to two days, according to a government report.
Britain has only recently released a large backlog of trucks at the border. At the end of December 20, the French government suddenly closed its border for 48 hours to prevent the spread of a new variant of the coronavirus from England. Thousands of trucks and their drivers were stuck for days. As soon as the border was reopened, drivers were required to report a negative coronavirus test before being allowed to enter France.
The delays at the normally busy port have also raised concerns about Britain’s fresh food supply, many of which are imported from the rest of Europe in the winter. A fruit supplier urgently arranged for goods to be shipped to the country, and British fish and seafood exporters struggled to ship their goods to France before they spoiled.
The spectacle raised concerns about trade after December 31, the end of the Brexit transition period. Although goods are already moving more slowly because drivers’ coronavirus tests can take about 40 minutes to deliver results, trucks are unlikely to be waiting by the thousands to enter France on Friday, thanks to the vacation period Quieter.
In fact, some ferry crossings between Dover and Calais have been canceled Friday afternoon because the demand was very low.
“We expect the continuous interruption to worsen in the first two weeks as demand for freight increases,” says the government report. This can last for about three months.
Frictionless trade has been replaced by a myriad of paper and electronic declarations for exporters, importers and logistics companies. Products entering the European Union from England, Scotland and Wales now require customs checks, including safety certificates, and truck drivers will need a permit to enter Kent, the county containing Dover and Folkestone, to confirm who have the necessary documents.
Truck drivers coming in the opposite direction face fewer requirements for now. Britain relaxed the rules for products arriving in the country from the European Union for six months.
In Calais, the first vehicle to leave for Britain via the Eurotunnel transport train on Friday morning was from Romania, carrying mail and parcels. The mayor of the French coastal town, Natacha Bouchart, pressed a button allowing the truck to leave.
It was a “historic moment”, she said, that “will have consequences the extent of which we do not yet know”.
Antonella Francini contributed reporting from Paris.