By Rosemary Kluth
Picture, if you will, an elderly couple booked to return to Germany on the ferry after their annual holiday on the North Cornish coast.
It is the day after the General Election – an ordinary Friday during the school term in early July.
Despite having arrived at Dover a cautious two hours early, we find ourselves gridlocked in the queue for Frontier Control, with several lanes of traffic moving at snail’s pace beside us. One car is being processed about every five minutes.
It is a hot day, and tempers are fraying. As the cars are still moving – albeit excruciatingly slowly – it is well-nigh impossible to take a comfort break or fetch something to eat.
After almost two hours, we finally reach the kiosk, only to find the passport official sitting with his back turned, having a leisurely chat with his lady colleague. It seems ages before he deigns to turn to face us and take the proffered passports. These he deals with, unsmilingly, and again at snail’s pace. My usually successful attempts at being charming meet with a stony silence, quite unlike the usual cheery response. This feels disconcerting, but at least we are through, and the road ahead is clear.
By this time, it is past sailing time for our ferry, but thinking it might be delayed, and we might just still reach it, we hurry on, only to be waved into a shed marked Security. A few men are inspecting a camper van on the right, but the lane to the left is clear, and an official appears to be waving us through with a thumbs up signal. Relieved, we drive on, only to be shouted at and hauled back with an ear-piercing whistle. Apparently, we do need to be inspected after all. The said official – a stern Scot with a military bearing that suggests he will take no nonsense – inspects the car from all sides, before fetching out a contraption on wheels like an old-fashioned carpet sweeper. This is covered all over with mirrors and proves to be designed for looking under the car. I should remind you, dear reader, that we are leaving, rather than entering the UK, so are unlikely to be harbouring any illegal migrants (unless of course they are Brefugees). Having assured himself that no-one is clinging to the underside of the car, he turns his attention to the engine compartment. We are told to lift the bonnet so that he can shine his torch into the precious few little nooks and crannies left in a modern car. We ask (politely) what the point of all this is, and are told he is looking for vehicle defects and oil leaks – again pretty superfluous, in that we are travelling in a well-kept five-year-old Mercedes, and will at most be polluting – and/or breaking down on – European roads. The whole performance is chillingly reminiscent of hostile checks at the East German border under Soviet dictatorship. They used mirrors there, and the attitude was similar.
We are finally waved on and reach the DFDS check-in to be told by the friendly young man in the kiosk that we have missed our 10.40 ferry to Calais, and will have to take the 12 mid-day crossing to Dunkirk. We complain about the delay, and he rolls his eyes and comments, “They’re always especially slow when it’s busy – it’s disgusting!”
The mid-day ferry, too, is delayed, resulting in our arriving in Cologne two hours late, tired, frustrated and hungry, as there has been no time for the planned rest/lunch break on the road.
We have been holidaying in Cornwall for upwards of 40 years and have never before had such a hostile reception at the border. The thought of undergoing the same delays – and indeed worse after the introduction of the new biometric checks this autumn – is not making us rush to rebook for next year. Who would knowingly choose to spend hours queueing in a hot car with no toilet or refreshment facilities – especially in the recent summer temperatures? Long delays at the border will not escape the notice of potential tourists from the Continent, who – like us – will quite likely be frightened away by the prospect.
Looking back in the light of Brexit, we even wonder if that is the intention.
I am reading this sitting in my ‘new’ kitchen in Tuscany on the two year anniversary of our departure from our home in Cornwall fleeing the restrictions which had driven a coach and horses through our retirement plans. No more flipping across to Europe at will but having to watch the 90 day clock. Something which was unheard of pre 1973 when we joined the EEC, mum and I would travel to her family around Lake Como at will, maybe a white chalk mark on the baggage nothing more. When we are asked what we are doing here everyone, but everyone rolls their eyes when we explain we are Brexit refugees. I love Italy but at my age I would have preferred to love Italy and the rest of Europe with a base in Cornwall and come when I wanted to with easy open borders. I apologise with all my heart to the writers of the article. And now I read Storm Boris continues to destroy Europe how apt