Port of Dover Critical Incident

[AndreaC74]

Why are we blaming the french? they didn't vote for Brexit and aren't responsible for increasing/paying for extra capacity at the French border posts on UK soil.

Stamping passports is what happens to 3rd country nationals & that adds time, a lot of it, when dealing with 100s of '000s of passengers, plus having recently been to France, i ve seen UK people arguing with French officials because they don't want their passports stamped!

The UK seems incapable of organising anything at the moment, the numbers travelling across the channel is entirely predictable and delays we are now seeing were talked about pre 2016, i remember seeing the graphs on how long the queues would be for just a few seconds of delay for each passenger.... all Project Fear.

To all those who voted for Brexit - told you so.

Perhaps you could paddle to the continent on your blue passports and avoid the queues that way.

This is a direct consequence of Brexit, because if we were still in the EU, the extra admin at the border wouldn't be needed. And if the French borde rauthorities have a lot of people down with COVID, they can't just magic up extra staff - people need training, security clearance and so on.

So yep, we need to own this. Brexiteers were warned and they shouted about Projct Fear.

Why the Fuck should The French (who didnt vote for Brexit) put on extra staff to deal with the extra admin caused by it?
It would be a Non from me

I travelled through Dover port at October half term last year (so post-Brexit and with lots of covid paperwork) and it was absolutely fine.

So I don't understand why it's such an utter shambles now. Have there been any significant changes to the rules since then?

And "yes please" to the poster who suggested an "I didn't vote for this shit" queue!

And why should the French magic up extra staff anyway? It's up to them how many staff they want to employ for immigration and border control. If that makes queues on the UK side, well tough luck to us. It didn't have to be that way, if we'd kept freedom of movement. So yes, it's because of Brexit. They're hardly going to go out of their way to make life easier for citizens of a third-country wanting to enter - why should they? There are always long queues at borders for people not in the EU or from that country.

Summer holidays, I would imagine. Even accounting for half-term, October is never as busy as late July and August.

I suspect that it's Brexit voters who are kicking off about the passports being stamped, because Remain voters knew the ramifications.

In which case, they've got no right to kick off because they got what they wanted. They wanted queues at customs, they wanted Roaming charges, they wanted all of this.

@OliveHenry - Last October, passports were not being stamped - this has only started this year and is exacerbating waiting times. Previously, anyone with an EU passport would have been waved through and no need for stamping them. We really cannot blame the French for this - it's a problem of our own making which was foreseen and conveniently ignored.

It IS BREXIT!!

It wouldn't matter an iota if we were still part of EU.

It is ALL to do with us... As we voted for the populist nonsense... That is would somehow be better...

So far... Brexit disaster has cost much more than covid...

I think they should go down the lanes of parked cars and ask the occupants if they voted for Brexit. Surprisingly most would say no, yet somehow 52% voted to leave.
I can't seem to find any people in real life who will admit to voting to leave to my face. Unfathomable! Where have they gone?

Of course this is a direct consequence of the end of free movement and leaving the EU.

Sorry for all the people stuck there. We traveled over to France when our kids broke up a while back and it was quiet as.

The problem with Brexit isn't actually the people who voted for it, it's the lack of engagement from the people who thought "They'll never vote to leave the EU so I won't bother voting. It'll never pass".

I realise that I'm probably not speaking to many of those people on MN but that is why it got through. Not enough people were mobilised to vote to stay IN the EU. The vote leave team appears to have been better organised.

People are blaming the French because it's a French problem.

Rather like Emirates airline blaming the Brits for the fuck ups at Heathrow.

Not having capacity to meet demand is bad, whether there's a Brexit context or whether there is none.

I'm not sure we can blame it all on Brexit. Look at the chaos in our own airports since Covid. The airlines and airports laid off thousands of staff because demand has been tiny for the last two years. Now demand is back, they have failed spectacularly to replace staff in time.

It seems reasonable that the same has happened in France. It just proves that they are as hopeless at forward planning as is the UK. It's hardly a surprise.

Hmm. It's funny how those who use "snowflake" as an insult are usually the ones actually melting down.

Hardly the fault of Brexit - which was a democratic process that was won by the people who voted to Leave.

French understaffing is solely on them - it's not only the ports, recently there were incidents elsewhere too. Ultimately they've had a long time to sort out the staffing crisis and they haven't.

Why is it a French problem? They didn't vote for it, they didnt ask for it. The people it's affecting are, in the main, people from the country who did vote for it, who did ask for it. If I were French, I'd not have put any more staff on than they did prior to Brexit and let the British public stew in their own 52% shit. Maybe one day, people will realise the idiocy of that vote.

I voted Remain by the way - but saying all issues are due to Brexit when there's been long-term underlying causes is simply ridiculous.

Those blue passports make it all worthwhile, don't they?

This was bound to happen wasn't it? They didn't need so many booths pre Brexit.

I'm very glad I got the chance to work in Europe before this ridiculousness. I couldn't do it now and come home for weekends and holidays.

But this is caused by Brexit. There weren't queues before 37% of the electorate decided there should be queues. The remaining 63% (and it's the 26% who didn't vote that annoy me even more than the 37% who voted leave) didn't vote for these queues.

I'm currently on a coach heading to Canterbury which was then heading to Dover and Folkestone. Unfortunately the coach can't get further than Canterbury so those needing to go further have been advised to get taxi/train down.
Taxi will be stupidly expensive and as most of these guys are tourists the train certainly makes it more challenging. Theres a time issue as well as there's a cruise shop going out they need to catch.

Freedom of movement has been taken away from us due to Brexit, folks were warned but the EU apparently needs us more than we need them,
Chickens come home to roost now.