A £40m border processing facility designed to ease summer gridlock at the Port of Dover is standing empty — its 84 kiosks switched off by French authorities — as the chief executive warns the port faces "repeated episodes of severe congestion" unless a last-minute flexibility is granted.
Doug Bannister, chief executive of the Kent port, said he had done "absolutely everything" to prepare for the summer getaway. But the new Entry Exit System (EES) facility, built to register fingerprints and photographs of passengers entering the Schengen Area, has not been activated for cars. The French authorities have not switched on the kiosks, and no date has been set for when they will.
“Port of Dover CEO warns of severe congestion this summer as new £40m EU border kiosks remain unused.”
"We delivered our Western Docks facility after investing £40m of our capital," Bannister said. "We were under constant pressure to have it be operational, pursuant to the timeline that was EES, and it's been specifically designed to handle our peak volumes safely and efficiently, and we can't use it."
The warning comes after the port declared a "critical incident" during the May half-term, when waiting times reached four-and-a-half hours on a day with about 8,500 outbound vehicles. This summer threatens to be worse: the port expects 7,500 outbound cars on Friday, rising to nearly 10,000 on Saturday, and an even busier peak of about 10,500 cars on both 24 and 25 July.
EES was rolled out fully in April and, for most UK travellers, the biometric registration happens at foreign airports. But at Dover, Eurotunnel's Folkestone terminal and London St Pancras — all of which have juxtaposed border controls — the checks take place before departure. Bannister recently told MPs the port would "face repeated episodes of severe congestion" unless the EU permits more flexibility in the system, which has not happened.
Since May, the port has installed new border positions in its ferry terminal, and the French authorities have agreed to its suggested resource requirements. Holidaymakers are being urged to use only main roads when driving to the port and to arrive no more than two hours before their booked sailing. Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander recently met her French counterpart, Philippe Tabarot, to call for a "pragmatic approach" to EES checks.
Bannister said Alexander had "leaned in personally on trying to get the…" — the sentence was cut in the original — but added: "We've done absolutely everything that we can in preparing for the summer. But there are still a lot of unknowns and uncertainties around how the EES process will affect travel."