French customs reject British shellfish shipments after UK ‘reset’ deal with EU
One of Britain’s largest mussel exporters has suffered a £150,000 loss, after three of its shipments to the EU were rejected in recent weeks by French customs,Family-run business Offshore Shellfish, based in Devon, has continued exporting blue mussels to its European customers since Brexit, despite the administrative burden and onerous paperwork requirements,However, the past month has seen three out of four lorries prevented from entering the EU by customs officials at the port of Boulogne-sur-Mer for various reasons, which the company’s commercial director Sarah Holmyard called “subjective and inconsistent”,“We have sent hundreds and hundreds of loads since Brexit,We’ve never had a single one rejected,” Holmyard told the Guardian.
“We’ve had a couple of paperwork issues, but we’ve never had our mussels rejected and now in the last month we’ve had three loads rejected.”The mussels are grown on ropes in the waters of Lyme Bay, several miles off the coast of south Devon.The company exports the vast majority of what they grow, sending them for processing in the Netherlands, with most ending up in restaurants or on supermarket shelves in Belgium where they are a key ingredient in one of its national dishes: moules-frites.Few Belgian diners may realise some of the bowls of mussels and french fries they regularly enjoy contain molluscs grown across the Channel.All three rejected loads had to be destroyed, at the company’s cost.
The rejected shipments did not differ from previous deliveries, Holmyard said, leaving the company confused and suffering from the unexpected financial hit.“It’s completely subjective and it’s inconsistent, which means you can’t plan for it.It’s just a lottery at the moment whether they get through or not, and we absolutely can’t run a business in that way because it’s too uncertain.”Since Brexit, deliveries of animal and plant products between Britain and the EU have required health and veterinary checks, supplemented by paperwork, and have been subject to stringent inspections at the border as a part of sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) controls.Live mussels, oysters, scallops, cockles and clams – classified as “live bivalve molluscs” – are subject to especially stringent EU rules.
They can only be imported to the bloc without treatment if they come from waters deemed of the highest quality, which is not the case for most of the water in England and Wales, although Offshore Shellfish’s farms are in waters which are considered “class A” for most of the year,As a result, shellfish exporters, and other food producers are seen as some of the main beneficiaries of the “reset” deal between Keir Starmer’s government and the EU announced in May, which is designed to remove the need for SPS checks,British diners do not have the same appetite for homegrown shellfish like mussels as their continental counterparts, and the vast majority of shellfish and other seafood caught in UK waters is exported to Europe,Negotiations are expected to begin this month, with the aim of a deal being implemented in 2027,This is viewed as too long a wait by many in the shellfish industry.
In the meantime, Holmyard and other food exporters in the UK shellfish industry have reported an increase in border checks, and even rejections of their produce on the European side of the Channel, since the reset was announced.“The cited reason [for the rejection of two lorries] was that they hadn’t been properly washed.But they came out of clean water and they were washed,” Holmyard said.“I think, and I’m not alone in thinking this, that it is political,” she added, given that their produce had only been rejected after the announcement of the reset of UK-EU relations.The French customs service did not provide a comment.
The Guardian understands the UK government is not aware of a significant increase in rejections of British goods of animal or plant origin entering the EU,A government spokesperson said: “We are focused on negotiating an SPS deal that could add up to £5,1bn a year to our economy, by cutting costs and reducing red tape for British producers and retailers,“We continue to engage with industry and EU border teams to maintain trade whilst protecting our biosecurity,”Mussel growers like Offshore Shellfish don’t tend to harvest the molluscs during the summer – between April and August – when the mussels are spawning and then recovering.
The seizure of the deliveries sent to the continent happened right at the start of the export season, when the company expected to start earning money again from sales.Offshore Shellfish was set up by Holmyard’s father John, who has been farming mussels for 30 years.The company has been holding talks with French officials in the hope of resolving export challenges.After negotiations by the Holmyards, their Dutch partners and the UK government, the authorities in Boulogne-sur-Mer have agreed to be more flexible in how they interpret the rules.However, this has not yet been put to the test and the company hopes to start exporting again soon.
“We’ve lost a lot of money in the last few weeks just on these failed loads and it’s not something we can continue to do,” said Holmyard.The company is also concerned that it might lose its customers if repeated failed deliveries give it a reputation for being unreliable.“It’s a lot of food waste and live animal waste, at a time both nations [France and the UK] are meant to be looking at food security,” she said.
Ed Miliband needs a plan now to help industry weather UK transition to net zero | Phillip Inman
Ed Miliband may want his political legacy to be a transition to net zero, but he could find his eventual political epitaph includes words on how he helped bury UK industry under the weight of high electricity charges.Industrial ovens are being switched off and turbines spun for the last time as businesses add up the cost of powering their factories and decide it’s not worth the time and trouble.It would be harsh to blame the energy secretary for a crisis he inherited and a decline in manufacturing that has been going on for four decades. But the way the transition to renewables was managed under the Tories, and now under Miliband can only be described as a disaster that will see much of UK industry depart for an easier life elsewhere.The decline is not new
What is private credit, and should we be worried by the collapse of US firms?
The collapse of two US firms, First Brands and Tricolor, has shone a light on private credit and its growing influence in the global economy.The failures have led to ballooning losses at traditional banks, and, coupled with worries about the health of US regional banks, have raised concerns about weak lending standards and potential threats from an opaque corner of the so-called shadow banking sector.But what is private credit and should we be worried?Private credit emerged in the 1980s as a relatively niche industry offering private loans to businesses.Unlike banks, where loans are backed by customer deposits, private credit firms’ loans are backed by money raised from private investors, including pension funds, insurers and high net worth individuals. But they have become increasingly intertwined with the traditional banking industry, with lenders in Europe and the EU significantly exposed to private credit firms
‘I lost 25 pounds in 20 days’: what it’s like to be on the frontline of a global cyber-attack
The security chief of SolarWinds reflects on the Russian hack that exposed US government agencies – and the heart attack he suffered in the aftermathTim Brown will remember 12 December 2020 for ever.It was the day the software company SolarWinds was notified it had been hacked by Russia.Brown, the chief information security officer at SolarWinds, immediately understood the implications: any of the company’s more than 300,000 global clients could be affected too.The exploit allowed the hackers remote access to the systems of customers that had installed SolarWinds’ network software Orion, including the US treasury department, the US department of commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration, along with thousands of companies and public institutions.Brown says he was “running on adrenaline” in the first few days after the attack
Inside San Francisco’s new AI school: is this the future of US education?
In the world’s tech innovation epicenter, an “AI-powered” private school has made headlines for unabashedly embracing the technology.Alpha School San Francisco, which opened its doors to K-8 students this fall, is the newest outpost of a network of 14 nationwide private schools. Its learning model entails just two hours of focused academic work per day, during which the school says students can learn twice as fast as their counterparts in traditional schools – with the help of artificial intelligence.AI, Alpha says, is central to the school’s learning philosophy, brand and impact on students.Alpha is not alone in its efforts to incorporate AI into the classroom
Verstappen wins sprint race after Norris and Piastri collide, before US Grand Prix qualifying – live
Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri collided with each other on the first lap again as the title rivals were both dumped out of the United States sprint.The buildup to the weekend has been dominated by the “consequences” imposed by McLaren on Norris after the team held him responsible for banging wheels with Piastri in Singapore a fortnight ago. That minor tap paled into insignificance compared with the carnage at turn one of Saturday’s sprint in Austin, as Norris was left with only three tyres on his car.Starting from third, Piastri – who leads Norris by 22 points in the championship standings – attempted to cut back up the inside of his teammate but turned into Sauber’s Nico Hülkenberg and, as a result, smashed into the rear left of Norris’s car.Norris was spun round as his left-rear tyre was sent careering across the track
Champions Day horse racing at Ascot: shock winners at 200-1 and 100-1 – as it happened
Greg Wood’s report from AscotChampions Day pain for puntersAll eyes were on the Champions Stakes ahead of Champions Day at Ascot and while Calandagan was a worthy winner and may have put up the Flat racing performance of the season it was the big-priced winners on the day who made the headlines with Powerful Glory, at 200-1, and Cicero’s Gift, at 100-1, pulling off almighty shocks on a day when the racegoers flocked to the track to supposedly crown “champions”.With the ground riding fast after a prolonged dry spell this was not what was supposed to be expected. However, those sorts of results can come at the end of a long season and is partly the reason why Champions Day doesn’t always prove to be the day when the best come to the fore. Good night for now – we’ll be back with a live blog on Boxing Day as the focus now turns to jump racing.1 Crown Of Oaks 5/1 2 Ebt’s Guard 10/1 3 Holloway Boy 16/1 4 Shout 6/14
Australia selector confident Pat Cummins will play major part in Ashes
Curran and rain to England’s rescue against New Zealand in T20 opener
New Zealand v England: first men’s T20 cricket international hit by rain – as it happened
Unbeaten England eye place in semis but results have masked woeful batting | Raf Nicholson
Risk of wheel bashing and strategy sets up complicated US Grand Prix
Taunts add spice as big three vie for Champion Stakes in thrilling Ascot finale