The announcement of the UK-EU reset deal on Monday (19 May) is set to render a number of recently-built port facilities unnecessary, according to senior industry figures.
The deal commits the two parties to negotiate a new sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) agreement which will reduce the need for checks on plant and animal products moving across the border – the purpose for which many of the facilities were built.
The FT reports that as many as 41 border sites built to carry out post-Brexit checks will be made redundant by the deal, leaving operators looking for new buyers or even considering demolition in order to find more productive uses for the land.
Speaking anonymously to the FT, one executive said:
“We were made to spend millions constructing them at breakneck speed, then hired people to work in them, and now we learn they are not going to be required at some point in the future.”
Sevington
One high-profile candidate for sale is the government-run Sevington Border Control Post (BCP) in Ashford, which provides SPS checks on animal and plant good entering the UK via the Port of Dover. The site was built in 2021 specifically to accommodate post-Brexit checks.
Sources told the FT that the government has approached both Eurotunnel and the Port of Dover about acquiring the site now that the UK-EU reset deal is set to reduce the volume of checks required on SPS goods.
The port’s chief executive, Doug Bannister, did not confirm the sale, only saying that he will “continue our discussions with the government for what this means for the BCP at Sevington”.
The publication reports that the Sevington BCP cost £23m to run in the first year since checks came into force in April 2024. However, the Common User Charge used to fund the facility raised less than £12.6m over roughly the same period (May 2024 to March 2025).
Prior to becoming operational, the BCP was never far from controversy. Its construction was questioned by the Dover Port Health Authority, given its location 22 miles from the Port of Dover. It was argued that it would be safer to use the port’s existing, on-site Bastion Point BCP.
Portsmouth
On the south coast, Portsmouth’s BCP has become another site made redundant in light of the new EU deal, the Guardian reports.
Describing the BCP as a “white elephant”, Mike Sellers, the director of Portsmouth International Port, said the EU reset deal “negates the need for the border control post”, which leaves Portsmouth City Council with two choices:
“Repurpose the facility and see whether we can get another use out of it, or demolish it to give us some more operational land”.
Demolishing the facility may prove unpopular; it was built with £17.1m of a £200m government funding pot that Portsmouth City Council received to improve port infrastructure. However, this was insufficient to cover all building costs, and the council took out a loan to cover the remainder of the £25m BCP construction cost.
However, speaking to the Guardian, Richard Ballantyne, chief executive of the British Ports Association, explained that “it is very expensive to repurpose and modify the border facilities”, and that demolition can ultimately prove “more cost-effective”.
Even prior to the announcement of the EU deal, the facility’s value has been questioned. Since April last year, when SPS checks were introduced, an average of only three checks per day has been carried out at the Portsmouth facility.
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