Yet again this Tory government, supported by its cheerleaders in the rightwing media, uses the travel chaos in Kent as an excuse to blame the French for its own failings (Kent travel chaos: is there a fix and should Brexit take the blame?, 25 July). The cause of this chaos is in plain sight: Brexit.
It’s simple arithmetic. Dover is a port of entry to the Schengen area and passports must now be stamped. With around 10,000 cars transiting the port on Saturday, even with a conservative estimate of one minute of extra processing time per car, this adds an additional 166 hours for traffic to clear French border control. The French should be congratulated for the speed at which they are processing each car, not accused of being asleep on the job.
This government has also failed to invest in infrastructure despite warnings by the local communities in which I live. The A2 is still a single carriageway into the port, the M20/A20 becomes a lorry park because there has been no investment in holding areas and no thought has been given to nearby alternative ports such as Ramsgate.
David Hammond
Woodnesborough, Kent
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