Kent's Council leaders come together to warn of potential delays

Kent's council leaders have come together to warn of of potential delays which could last over 12 hours.

It's due to new EU border checks being introduced.

On 10th November, The Entry Exit System (EES) will require British visitors to the EU to register biometric information.

Roger Gough is the leader of the Kent County Council. He believes the county and country will be impacted.

He said: "All of us as leaders, coming from a variety of different political view points, to have a very valuable meeting of where we are now, and signing off on a letter for what we think the current situation is.

"The things we are asking for, are pretty much the same as we have been for a long time, and we have made a bit of progress on this in a number of area.

I certainly don't want to apply that the government are doing nothing on this, as that's not the case, but we do need to see rapid progress on this in a number of areas.

"There have been occasion in the past where there have been massive delays, 14 hours or so on, and it could be that.

"What we can say from experience is when something goes wrong at the ports, the impact on Dover and the surrounding communities is pretty big and pretty expensive.

"Major visitor attractions are affected by it, as the roads are blocked. It can have an impact of delivery and services and for people to get around and it clearly can impact the perception of Kent as a place to do business and invest."

In a letter to Transport Secretary Louise Haigh, council leaders said the checks "threaten to result in extremely serious delays" for international trade and travellers.

In response, the Department for Transport said it was "reviewing the preparations that have been made so far."