Lorry drivers face being stuck for days in makeshift camp on Manston airfield

Desperate lorry drivers stranded in makeshift camps at Kent’s Manston airport have pleaded to be allowed home for Christmas amid fears that even with the introduction of rapid testing the backlog of drivers willl take days to clear. 

The military is heading to Kent today to start a mass testing programme after France confirmed it would allow hauliers with a negative Covid test to travel across the French border.

The rapid test kits deliver results in under an hour, but there are fears the growing backlog of waiting trucks will not be cleared ahead of December 25.

It has caused tensions to flare between drivers and police at the Port of Dover as European hauliers asked to be able to return home to their families. 

One Polish driver told MailOnline: ‘We are sick of this – I’ve been in Dover for two days and want to go home for Christmas. The French said their border was being opened but we haven’t seen any evidence of this being true. 

‘There’s thousands of people queuing to get through the port and the roads are all at a standstill. Nobody wants another night sleeping in their cab.’ 

A German van driver who drove to the UK to make a delivery in Liverpool, and has been trapped in Kent since the weekend, said: ‘I would like to go back home for Christmas.’

He told BBC Radio 4: ‘At the moment it’s a catastrophe situation because I can’t go back home. I must come here to make a covid test appointment. 

The people from Manston covid test centre told me to go to Margate, and the people from Margate told me to go back to Manston again, and I really do not know what to do. 

‘I want to go back to my family for Christmas. They are waiting for me. Every family is waiting for their men (currently at Manston).’    

The drivers’ comments follow 48 hours of chaos on the south coast of England. Kent County Council have sent emergency supplies to the county to help the stranded truckers, including portable toilets after a driver yesterday described the facilities in Dover as ‘not a pretty sight’ . 

The council is also handing out food and water to drivers unable to leave Marston airport.

The council said in a statement: ‘On the M20, Kent County Council continues to ensure drivers are provided with snacks, drinking water and hot food. 

‘Portable toilets were rolled out Monday at 1 km intervals between junctions 10a-11 and these are being regularly cleaned.

‘A further 150 toilets are available for drivers at Manston, where there are also hot food trucks and water. 70 additional toilets will arrive at Manston tomorrow morning.’

Rapid turnaround testing will be carried out in Dover today, but that even with the fast tests, it will take days to clear the backlog of hauliers stranded at the port.

Lines of drivers were seen clashing with police wearing high-vis gear as they demanded to be let home. One man was seen on his knees gesturing wildly for the border to be reopened. 

It is a sharp contrast to the scenes witnessed yesterday when drivers attempted to keep spirits high. 

One driver was seen pouring wine into cardboard drink cups before serving it to his friends, while another group enjoyed a vodka and Coke around a small Christmas tree decked with used drinks cans.

Others also attempted to take the travel chaos in their stride. One Turkish long-haul truck driver, seemingly unfazed by the mass-disruption around him, was seen tucking into a Mediterranean breakfast at a Kent truck stop off the M20.

Another cooked breakfast from the back of his lorry. One driver was also spotted hanging out clothes and towels to dry on the front of his lorry.

But not all were happy with the disruption and furious French drivers blamed Emmanuel Macron for the chaos at Dover after his travel ban left hundreds stranded in the UK.

One French apple grower cried ‘Macron, merde! Let me come home,’ as she anxiously awaited news on plans to lift the cross-Channel travel ban.

Marie Noelle, 63, from the city of Tours, desperately wants to cross the Channel to attend the funeral of her mother, who died on Sunday.

But she and hundreds of others like her today remain stranded in the Kent port town as French and British officials attempt to thrash out a deal to lift the travel ban. 

It came as the EU urged European countries to drop all travel bans imposed on the UK, including on the movement of freight. 

Industry experts estimate that more than 4,000 food and drink lorries are being held up by the French travel ban which has caused gridlock at the port of Dover. Photos showed 873 lorries parked at the disused Manston Airfield – which was previously reserved for a No Deal Brexit. 

Some fear not being able to return to their families in time for Christmas, while others have bemoaned the toilet situation for stranded drivers – with one saying ‘they are not a pretty sight’.  

Emergency talks are taking place today in a bid to end the travel ban, with the French president expected to announce plans to reopen the border later today. 

The 48 hour closure is due to end at 11pm UK time tonight but France was not alone in imposing restriction on the UK, with more than 40 countries having banned flights. 

The decision by France to ban freight, as well as passenger travel, caught Number 10 off guard with some officials and ministers of the view that Mr Macron is trying to use the situation as leverage in Brexit talks. A transport industry source told The Times that Downing Street was ‘incandescent’ when the ban was announced.

But with talks ongoing today over a possible border Covid testing scheme, and Highways England warning that delays could last several days, some lorry drivers fear the prospect of missing Christmas with their families.

Ms Noelle faces missing her mother’s funeral due to the travel ban. Her mother, Paulette Poujet, died aged 87 on Saturday after a four month battle with Alzheimers. 

Ms Noelle said: ‘The funeral is at 2pm on Wednesday. I simply must be there. I want to go through first but I know every person wants the same.

‘But we have a seven hour journey from Calais and it does not look like we will move soon. This makes me so sad. I cannot stop crying.

‘Look at this situation with all these people waiting. It is not normal. I am French, but this is all our fault.’ 

Others fear the prospect of missing Christmas with their families due to the travel ban.

One lorry driver told BBC Radio Four’s Today Programme: ‘I feel bad, really bad, terrible in fact. We known nothing, we don’t know if we can get home to see our families for Christmas.’

On plans for lorry drivers to be tested before their return, he said: ‘It will be good, but maybe in Dover there are 1,000 to 1,500 lorries.

‘If they implement testing here then maybe it will be a good idea, but they need to start now to get to Christmas Eve.’

‘There is no words to describe this. I came on Sunday and on Sunday they decided to close it. If I knew that one day before, I would never have come here.’ 

Lorry driver Caspar Pecherzewski, from Poland, is also among the lorry drivers caught up in queues at Dover since Sunday.

The 22-year-old said: ‘We can find a toilet, at a gas station or something, but we don’t have showers and stuff.

‘No one is saying anything about how long we will be here. The police just told us to wait.

‘I think I won’t be getting paid while waiting here and my company don’t know what to say because they don’t know what to do, the ports are closed.’

He added: ‘We’re stuck here and we don’t know how long it will take, this situation. It’s really f***** up.’

Trucker Elvis Abdulcair, 43, has a shipment full of Christmas cards and presents posted from England to Romania in his van.

He fears they will not be delivered in time for the big day on December 25.

Mr Abdulcair, who is driving with colleague Daniel Dragomir, also 43, said: ‘I feel like Santa Claus with no reindeers. My sleigh is grounded. 

‘It is very bad because all these people will not have their cards and presents from their family in time for Christmas.

‘The French government is s***. They have ruined it for everyone. And for what?

‘I have been here two days now and don’t know how much longer it will go on for. I just want to go home.’

Greg Mazurek, 36, and Simon Kopanearz, 30, have been stuck near the front of the queue outside the Port since 1pm on Monday.

Mr Mazurek was less than impressed at the toilet situation. He said: ‘No one has come to see us with food or anything. We have storage for three days but now we are having to go to the shops for food and water.

‘The bigger problem is the toilets in the city centre as there is a lot of drivers having to use them. It is not a pretty sight.’

Along with European drivers, British hauliers also face issues due to the travel ban.

Long-distance lorry driver Geoff Moxham could be about to miss his first Christmas at home in 45 years after France closed its borders with Britain.

The Cheltenham grandfather did not realise he was on the last ferry out of Dover until he started talking to a French member of staff who asked him how he was planning to get home.

Now, instead of putting his feet up on Christmas Eve, the dad-of-four faces being stuck at the side of the road with thousands of other drivers or driving down the motorway home.

He said: ‘I was 66 yesterday and spent my birthday on the road and I’m not planning to do the same at Christmas.’

‘I haven’t missed a Christmas at home for 45 years so I will be there even if I have to get a boat.’

HGV driver Frank could have officially retired on his 66th birthday on Sunday. Instead he was delivering heavy machinery to Germany for Charles Russell Transport in Deerhurst and drove on to the ferry to Calais at around 6pm on Sunday.

‘I was on the last ferry leaving the UK but I didn’t know until one of the French crew members I know wished me luck getting home

‘When I asked what he meant he said they were all finishing work and there would be no more transport back to the UK. I was completely taken aback.

‘I couldn’t believe it. There weren’t any announcements and nobody had said anything until then.’

However he remains determined to make it home for Christmas.

He said:  ‘I’ve been married for 44 years and have four daughters and 12 grandchildren so we normally have big family Christmases.

‘I don’t know what happening this year but my wife just called and asked if I can pick up some fresh vegetables on the way back.’

Laszlo Baliga, who was delivering food and water to those parked on Manston Airport runway, said one driver had told him the only toilet on the site was blocked.

‘No water and no toilet now – there is one toilet, but it is now blocked,’ the 51-year-old told the PA news agency.

Mr Baliga, from London, who himself is a lorry driver, said he began taking supplies to the disused airfield after Hungarian drivers posted on Facebook asking for help.

‘We have taken money from friends and gone to Asda, Tesco,’ he said.

‘This is our third time, we have already brought ready-to-eat sausages, bread, tomatoes, iceberg lettuce, coffee. Basic foods for now for the drivers.’

He said he and others have spent more than £500 on food and water for drivers inside the site.

‘When we see Hungarian drivers coming in we say stop, and the drivers take the things into the other side to give to everybody,’ he said.

‘We like to help because this is a difficult time.’ 

Pictures showed workers in green jackets handing out bottles of water today. Kent County Council has been handing out cereal bars to stuck truckers. 

It comes after Dover was yesterday plunged into a second night of chaos with up to 1,500 lorries now filling the motorway, side streets and laybys in the Kent town following the travel ban.

Emergency talks are ongoing in a bid to end the cross-Channel blockage, with Macron expected to announce his plan to end the travel ban later today. 

Boris Johnson last night made a personal appeal to the French president to lift the shutters to the continent.

They were slammed shut by France on Sunday night after the identification of a new Covid-19 strain in the UK. 

Britain and France are today discussing ways to control the spread of the virus, with testing at the border thought to be a key point in the discussion.

However a row is emerging over how and where to test drivers wanting to cross the channel.

France favours the slower PCR tests which can take up to three days to return with a result and can cost more than £180.

Paris also wants the testing to be carried out before an individual arrives on French soil.

This would put the cost of the programme on the UK and, with the inherent delay that comes with PCR tests, mean that delays at the border could last past Christmas, confining drivers to their lorries over the festive period.

France would also require arrivals to have some kind of certificate proclaiming their negative test result.

The UK, on the other hand, wants to use a rapid lateral flow test which can return a positive or negative result within 15 minutes. 

Vanessa Ibarlucea, of France’s National Federation of Road Transport, hit out at Macron’s preference for a PCR test. 

She said: ‘It takes 48 hours to get an appointment and another 48 hours to get the results of a PCR test. 

‘So our drivers will not be home with their families in time for December 24. Our drivers have been abandoned in a foreign country.’ 

However, even if this quicker method is used, the testing programme could cause logistical chaos with potentially 6,000 drivers a day needing to be screened.

Around two thirds of these drivers use the port of Dover and a third the Eurotunnel.

Today Highways England warned the chaos around the Kent port could last for days. Hundreds of lorries are currently waiting to cross the English Channel when it reopens.

The highways authority has urged hauliers not to drive to the border. Traffic measures Operation Stack and Operation Brock have been activated in a bid to calm the travel chaos. 

The Business, Energy, Industry and Sustainability Select Committee (BEIS) was today warned that halted trucks ‘need to move in the next 24 hours’ if supermarkets are to avoid empty shelves.

The warning came as Brussels said travel from the UK to the EU should be ‘discouraged’ due to fears about the mutant variant of coronavirus while talks continue to lift current bans on movement. 

Ian Wright, chief executive of the Food and Drink Federation (FDF), told MPs that the number of food and drink lorries affected by travel restrictions was far higher.

‘I don’t think the number of trucks in the queue is the relevant number,’ he said. ‘We reckon about 4,000 are on their way to Dover at various points. Anyone seeing this all happening in the run-up would have parked somewhere else, somewhere more congenial and in a better state.’ 

Duncan Buchanan, director of policy, England & Wales, at the Road Haulage Association, told MPs he was disappointed with how the Government presented the levels of freight disruption on Monday evening. 

‘We were very disappointed because of the way it was portrayed last night, as it was seeking to minimise the nature of the problem,’ he told the committee.

‘This is a very serious problem – whether you have moved trucks from one place to another, it is irrelevant. This is a very different level of supply chain disruption, of the like we have probably never experienced.

‘Many of the retailers are saying that we are up until Christmas, we will be fine until Christmas at least, but we must recover very fast to keep the shops fully stocked after Christmas. It’s a big worry.’

Retailers have called on shoppers not to panic buy, but have raised concerns that supply of some fresh produce, such as lettuce and broccoli, could be impacted by the disruption.

Andrew Opie, director of food and sustainability at the British Retail Consortium (BRC), told the BEIS committee: ‘The real issue we face is what happens in the next day or so.

‘If we do not see the empty trucks, which have already delivered to warehouses and stores, getting back over the channel, they will not be able to pick up the next consignment of fresh fruit, vegetables, salad vegetables.

‘What we’ve been told by members is that unless those trucks can start travelling again and go back to Spain and Portugal and other parts of Europe, we will problems with fresh produce from December 27.

‘What we need is for those trucks to move in the next 24 hours if we are to avoid seeing problems on our shelves.’

Mr Wright added that the disruption is also having a particular impact on food producers in the UK, warning that UK seafood could be destroyed if trucks continue to be halted.

‘There are dozens of lorries there with product that is going off. There is a huge hit here to Scottish seafood,’ he told MPs

‘All my members will tell you that the insurance policies they have will not cover the loss of goods due to circumstances like this.

‘If the Government was handing out train fares to go see Granny, they should compensate … those who through no fault of their own found themselves in this situation where millions of pounds of stock is going off as they sit in the queue.

‘We’ll be pressing them very hard to look at a compensation scheme.’ 

Home Secretary Priti Patel today said the Government was ‘working to get a resolution’ as talks continued with France on reopening full trade and transport across the Channel.

She told Sky News: ‘We’re working to get a resolution, I think that’s really important to put this into context.

‘It’s in both our interests, both countries to ensure that we have flow and of course there are European hauliers right now who want to be going home and quite frankly it’s in both our interests to carry on those discussions and negotiations and we will see what materialises today.’

Discussing the testing farce, she said: ‘Discussions about the type of testing will take place between the transport secretaries, both here and in Paris so I can’t speculate on the type of testing that will be used.  

‘But it is quite clear, I mean we ask passengers to take tests before they get on planes, it is quite clear now that mass testing and testing is the way forward so we will find proactive and productive ways in which if we have to introduce testing to make sure that happens and I think that will provide assurance and security all around.’

Ms Patel initially refused to be drawn on the number of lorries currently waiting at the border. But she later told BBC Radio 4 that there were 650 lorries on the M20 and 873 at nearby Manston Airport.

The total figure could be as high as 1,500 lorries, some say, with lorries now parked along the seafront at Dover.

Highways England yesterday estimated the total number of lorries to be almost 1,000 on the M20 alone.

As the crossing crisis continued, British food experts urged shoppers not to panic ahead of Christmas, saying there will be ‘plenty of food’.

Andrew Opie, director of food and sustainability at the British Retail Consortium, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘Just to be clear, there’s certainly not a problem for Christmas.

‘There’s plenty of food in the supply chain and in the stores at the moment, so nobody needs to be worried about food for Christmas dinners – there’s plenty of food for everybody and we can all shop normally.’

But he warned there could be issues after Christmas, saying: ‘There is a problem potentially directly after Christmas and that is really in fresh produce, so we’re talking here about things like salad, vegetables, fresh fruit, of which the vast majority come from Europe at this time.

‘Our view is as long as it can be cleared up today, there’ll be minimal impact for consumers.

‘Remember the shops are shut on Christmas Day, which takes one day of buying out of the equation, but those lorries that are stuck in Kent, they do need to get back within the next day.’

Meanwhile, a the top French haulage union has stoked fears of a driver strike, with an official warning ‘no trucker wants to deliver’ to Britain because of the new strain of coronavirus. 

Also across the Channel, Jean Marc Puissesseau, president of the Port of Calais, today backed plans for testing.

He told BBC Radio 4: ‘I think something should happen with this test, which should be put in force as soon as possible so they can come back. But in Calais it is very quiet.’ 

France yesterday indicated it will open up to lorries from Britain again, but demanded drivers register a negative test.

Mr Macron confirmed authorities could demand ‘PCR tests are presented as being negative upon the arrival on (French) territory.’

A PCR test can take two to three days to come back, suggesting drivers would be required to get tested in the UK before they leave for France.

It would also mean that people trying to get to France from Britain would need to present some form of certificate to get into the country. It is unclear what will happen if someone arrives at the border without proof of a negative test.

The French government has pledged to ‘resume movement’ as soon as possible, with the Port of Dover saying inbound lorries are now coming into the UK. 

The Road Haulage Association said it was ‘anyone’s guess,’ how a programme of testing at the border could be rolled out.

Paul Mummery, spokesman for the RHA told MailOnline: ‘Until we can understand what that process looks like, it’s difficult to gauge whether freight can start running again.

‘This is something they will want to do very, very quickly, but what that looks like is anyone’s guess.’

Unite’s national officer for road transport, Adrian Jones, said: ‘Drivers are suffering a nightmare before Christmas because of cross channel gridlock.

‘Unite has major concerns that many of those stuck in the immediate delays do not have access to proper toilets, washing facilities, decent food or places to rest outside of their cabs.

‘Nor it is just their physical needs that are being compromised. Waiting for hours and hours, with no idea of how long delays will continue for, is a huge cause of stress for drivers, with many fearing they might not get home in time for Christmas.’