Friday 15 January 2021

The fisherman's tale

The question of fish keeps rising up the political agenda. With Johnson and the government being pressed to offer "compensation" to fishermen who say they are now risking bankruptcy caused by the "sea of opportunity" that Brexit was supposed to offer them.  It seems to me the jury is still out on whether or not the extra bureaucracy is a short term glitch or a permanent issue that the industry must adapt to. As usual with these things it's somewhere in between.

BBC Wales had an item yesterday about a Welsh exporter of shellfish, Nerys Edwards who had hired a truck to ship a load of shellfish to the continent via Portsmouth.  She had, according to the BBC, spent two years preparing to export after Brexit and was confident she had all the documentation she needed. Her family business had already paid £48,000 to a group of 25 fishermen for the consignment.

Issues at the border left the consignment stuck in Portsmouth for 24 hours and a further 7 hours in Caen after the importer in France had made a mistake on a document that he needed to complete.  Ms Edwards told the BBC, "I can't do this again next week, I need a break."

"But I can't leave the fishermen without incomes for long," adding, "We're a tiny little Welsh company, its family run - we're fourth generation running it. We can't afford to take the hit."

Who will take the hit?

I remembered the same lady being so enthusiastic about Brexit that she told Channel 4 News in 2019 she claimed to still enthusiastically support leaving the European Union even after admitting to "having spent £40,000 to prepare her farming and shellfish businesses for a no deal Brexit."

She said: “I knew when I voted Leave that it would directly affect my business, both my businesses - the farming and the shellfish. But I also believe that I am not the important person here.  The whole nation is important so for the greater good is why I voted out. And for my grandchildren and their future, that’s why I voted out.”

Her grandchildren may not even have a business in future thanks to Brexit - as for the greater good - what?

Now there is nothing inherently wrong with form-filling, they are a necessary fact of modern life but deliberately introducing form-filling, and costly and complex ones at that, as a daily or weekly routine seems the height of madness. It's like having a tightrope on the way to the kitchen or decorating the entrance to your loo with razor wire.  There's nothing wrong with doing it and you can probably navigate it easily most days - but occasionally something will go wrong - as it did for her and the costs may wipe her out.

Her company, if it survives, will probably be unable to insure against her own mistakes and will therefore be constantly on a tight rope above a chasm - one small mistake, not necessarily her own but by one of the fishermen who supply her, a customer, a haulier or a customs official and she may be finished at any moment.  This is the issue - and the fact there is no upside at all in Brexit for her.

She is not about to export live shellfish to Australia or China or the USA.  The EU was, is and will always be her main market.

To give you an idea of the issues, Shane Brennan of The Cold Chain Federation tweeted about one of the problems exporters like her face:

In the thread, Mr Brennan says before you can import food into EU, the importer must make an entry onto an EU IT system (called TRACES NT) this can only be done on the EU side by the importer or an agent - for meat or dairy you also need a Certificate signed by a vet before TRACES.  He says this was all known BUT:

"The bit I did not know well is that this TRACES process creates a  Common Health Entry Document - filling in the 'CHED' correctly is one of the key live problems - it has to be done 100% right. Ensuring the CHED is right has proved to be a key priority issue for border officials."

The key phrase here is "100% right" and he goes on:

"Getting the CHED right is vital and, in practice, it requires the use of a specialist agent (a private professional) based IN THE BORDER POST - Imagine a row of car rental booths at the airport - each one charges a fee to make the entry and vouch for the goods (anyone got a pic?)

"With loads of businesses UK side being caught out on this need in the past week, the cost of these agents services has spiked (as much as 400 euro a consignment) That will settle  down to a lower amount but its still a new cost (millions a year) and additional to vet costs."

So in her case (as a food exporter) she now needs to pay someone in the EU border post to make an entry and ensure the Common Health Entry Document is correct - this is for every consignment.  And I assume these agents don't offer insurance against making an occasional error.  So she has added complexity, cost and risk to her business in exchange for .... what?

And Brennan says, having "reread the UK-side traders bible the Border Operating Model. There is no reference to these key real world issues, hardly any references to 'CHEDs' at all and no major talk of the role of the customs agent."  In other words even the government have misunderstood it!

What a mess.

How long before people like Mrs Edwards realise with Brexit, contrary to what David Davis once said, there is no upside only considerable downside. 

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