Port of Dover was ready for new border checks - chief

The Port of Dover Chief Executive said the organisation was ready for now-delayed new checks to come in

The Port of Dover chief executive said the organisation was ready to implement new border checks but he is pleased they have not come in as the technology is "untested" and "unproven".

Doug Bannister told BBC Radio Kent the infrastructure was in place at the port to introduce the now-delayed Entry-Exit System (EES) which was due on 10 November.

He said it was now an "uncertain period" with an unknown time frame for when they will be brought in.

Once in force, the system will allow UK passengers to have their fingerprints taken and faces scanned in order to enter the EU.

Mr Bannister said the port had the infrastructure in place

It was pushed back in October after Germany, France and the Netherlands said their systems were not ready.

"On the one hand, I'm really pleased that the European Union had made the decision to not move forward with untested, unproven technology," Mr Bannister said.

But he said it was now "awfully difficult" for port chiefs to try and plan until a new timeline was agreed.

He added that because it will be a digital process it should work better than current manual checks.

"That should be the philosophy that we are shooting for," he said.

"If we are taking a lot of manual activity away it should work even better."

Dover District Council leader Kevin Mills previously told a parliamentary hearing that the introduction of EES would have been "complete and utter carnage" and could have brought "gridlock on steroids" to Dover.

The port is one of three locations where the checks will be carried out in the UK, because in most cases they will happen on arrival at an international airport.

In August the government announced £10.5m worth of funding for the Port of Dover, Eurotunnel at Folkestone and Eurostar at St Pancras.

A government spokesperson previously said it was supporting ports and carriers to make sure they had the right technology and processes in place so registration could take place as "smoothly as possible".