🔴 Passengers travelling to Dover are being warned that the disruption to journeys could get worse over the weekend after drivers faced delays of up to seven hours on Friday.
By 7am, P&O Ferries was advising passengers that it would take up to four hours to reach the port and then pass border checks.attacked French authorities for “woefully inadequate” border control staffing that left Dover gridlocked.
As a furious blame game erupted, George-Francois Leclerc, the prefect of the Hautsde-France region, hit back and claimed an “unforeseen technical incident” in the Channel tunnel was the cause, with Pierre-Henri Dumont, Republican MP for Calais, claiming the problems at the Kent port are “an aftermath of Brexit”.
Asked this morning if there could be five to six-hour delays at the port again today, Mr Bannister told theprogramme: “It could be. We were expecting that today was going to be a busier day than yesterday. “Yesterday we processed about 8,500 cars going out. Today we were predicted to be around 10,000 so it is going to be a very busy day down here.”
He said the “post-Brexit environment” would mean “increased transaction times at the border” as passports need to be checked and stamped by the PAF.This morning, Dover and Deal MP Natalie Elphicke said there was “simply not enough French border police” working.she believed French border staff “have turned up today”, but warned of a “very serious situation” on Kent roads again today and branded claims by French officials that an incident in the Eurotunnel had led to the delays as “nonsense”.
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