Committee publication · Correspondence · 1 April 2025
Correspondence from Radoslav Stankov, Official Veterinarian, Dover Port Health Authority, regarding foot and mouth disease controls, dated 16 March 2025
From: Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee
Inquiry: Animal and plant health
Summary
Radoslav Stankov, Official Veterinarian at Dover Port Health Authority, writes to the EFRA Committee expressing serious concerns that biosecurity controls at the Short Straits (Dover) are fundamentally weaker than at other UK border entry points. He argues the Border Target Operating Model implementation there allows potentially FMD-contaminated imports to enter uncontrolled, travel 22 miles inland to inspection facilities, and contradicts government assurances that border systems prevent disease entry. He urges the committee to investigate and ensure effective controls are implemented.
Key findings
- Potentially FMD-affected products at Short Straits cannot be stopped and held at the border; consignments enter uncontrolled and travel 22 miles inland to Sevington BCP without oversight or control, unlike all other UK entry points.
- Rejected FMD consignments are permitted to re-export from Sevington uncontrolled with no systems ensuring they reach exit points, risking inland offloading and contamination of GB livestock.
- Consignments are not pre-notified as required by GB law, and no enforcement system exists at Short Straits despite Defra's public statement claiming wider border systems prevent entry.
- Government statements that restrictions on Hungarian and Slovakian products and border systems 'prevent' disease entry are inaccurate; restrictions exist 'only on paper' and are not effectively enforced at Short Straits, leaving a major biosecurity gap.
- Trailers are unloaded before reaching Sevington, permitted nowhere else in GB except the single government-operated BCP, and meat products from Germany have auto-cleared despite Defra system changes intended to stop FMD-susceptible goods from auto-clearing.
Tone
CriticalTopics
Key actors
Radoslav Stankov, Dover Port Health Authority, Alistair Carmichael MP, Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, Defra, Sevington Border Control Post, Hungarian and Slovakian authorities
Notable line
“Without effective, stringent controls at the point of entry to the Short Straits, our nation's farmers are not being protected in the way it has been implied.”
Key Quotes
“As a consequence of the bespoke implementation of the Border Target Operating Model (BTOM), and its exclusive application at the Short Straits, which is unreplicated at any other point of entry in the country, GB's biosecurity is being put at significant risk.”
“These consignments are able to enter the country, uncontrolled and are free to travel through the border, with the aspiration of attending and arriving at a Border Control Post (BCP) located 22 miles away from the border without any control or oversight to ensure they arrive …”
“Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) is highly contagious, and there is a serious risk that workers at inland facilities could inadvertently transfer the virus to livestock. For this reason, controls must be completed at the border, and these products should be stopped immediately upon arrival—not 15 days after importation.”
“Unlike any other point of entry in the country with a BCP, these consignments can travel freely without physical intervention across this border and into GB.”
“The reality is that these restrictions exist only on paper and are not being effectively enforced at the border for the Short Straits, or indeed on the West Coast where the CVO recently confirmed there is 'unfettered access to GB' .”
“To be clear, these goods are arriving via the Short Straits and are not being stopped at the border . They are dependent on finding their way to, and presenting at, the BCP at Sevington, and for those consignments that don't arrive, they travel inland, and it can take days for them to be detected, traced, and dealt with appropriately.”
“I urge the EFRA Committee to investigate this critical issue to ensure that effective border controls that deliver on biosecurity commitments are instigated at Dover and that Bastion Point is stood up.”
Source · parliament.uk record ↗