The government is headed for utter humiliation in a couple of months or even a couple of weeks. It is absolutely obvious that the borders will not be ready by January. Put out of your head any idea that we might leave without a deal or even that the transition period will end in January. There will be a deal and there will be an extended 'implementation' period. I have absolutely no doubt about it. And this isn't just about Covid-19 although that looks set to get much worse over the next few weeks. No, the truth is we are not ready - and nowhere near if reports coming out this week are true.
We first had a report from Reuters talking about "carnage" whether or not we get a deal as hauliers responsible for moving all the freight going between the UK and Europe face a "wall of bureaucracy" come January 1st.
The quote about carnage was from Tony Shally, managing director of freight specialist Espace Europe, who told Reuters. "We'll be fire-fighting from the 1st of January."
We are then told that the Association of Freight Software Suppliers (AFSS), the companies who are supposed to be developing all the new border IT systems, have written to HMRC to say they will not be ready in time because the government can't tell them exactly what's needed. Global Cold Chain News say:
"The association said its members could not guarantee delivery of the new Customs Declaration Service (CDS) because HMRC officials had failed to give it details and direction for the project. The AFSS has told HMRC that “most of its members” cannot get their software ready on time. The association said 'late delivery and gaps of detailed information' were to blame. And it warned that even if members could build a 'minimum viable product' in time, it was 'unrealistic' to expect end users to be fully trained on it by the year’s end."
We appear to be in the insane position of the government urging the industry to prepare for the end of transition - which will not be extended under any circumstances - while hauliers wait for essential IT systems that they have not even seen, and in turn, the software developers wait to be told what is needed by... the government! You couldn't make it up.
Meanwhile in the FT, Peter Foster has a report: Trained UK border staff being poached with government grant funds. This is about a government funded scheme to train new form fillers is being exploited by companies hiring experienced customs agents to plug the gap and add the extra 50,000 needed.
Apparently some companies are using the £50m scheme to recruit staff already working within the industry while still qualifying for up to £15,000 in subsidies per new employee. Salaries have gone up from £25K a year to £35K. So, we're getting few truly new recruits and the existing ones are churning between companies and costing much more - adding to the problem that exporters will face next year.
The fiction that all of a sudden these systems are going to appear, work perfectly from the start, communicate with each other and have all the users fully trained and ready to go in eight weeks time will soon be destroyed. Although I imagine the government know this already and are hatching a plan to manage it.
Last week Mel Stride, MP and Chair of the Treasury Select Committee wrote a seven page letter to Rishi Sunak demanding answers to a lot of questions raised after Lord Agnew gave evidence to them. In his letter, Stride says:
“Given the Government is largely responsible for all of these barriers to traders being able to prepare, the Committee thinks it is regrettable for Lord Agnew to characterise traders as having their ‘heads in the sand’. The Government must focus all its efforts on finalising its guidance, finalising its infrastructure, finalising its IT systems, and completing the negotiations, before it can point blame at companies for their lack of preparedness.”
I think what we will see in the next couple of weeks is an announcement that the UK-EU trade talks are going well with progress in all areas and that they are entering the "tunnel." When the deal is finalises it will include an extension which will be ascribed to a lack of readiness on both sides. Johnson will say an extension is OK because we got what we wanted by displaying toughness and the ERG will grumble but accept it.
Next as details come out about what has been agreed it will, as with the WA, slowly dawn on the ERG that we will be tied to Brussels rules in some convoluted fashion because every time parliament passes any legislation, MPs will have to take into account the EU's reaction and the risk of retaliatory moves under the trade deal. This is going to be an explosive moment for the Tory party and may well begin the inevitable split between moderates and the UKIP tendency.
All talk of cake will be over,
