A FARMING union has slammed plans to delay border checks on imported goods from the European Union, saying it undermines UK farmers and producers.

The Farmers’ Union of Wales (FUW) has described plans to delay border checks on goods imported from the European Union for a fourth time as a ‘global disgrace’ saying that the move will extend concessions for foreign businesses that ‘may as well be deliberately aimed at undermining UK farmers and producers’.

Checks on imports from the EU should originally have been introduced in January 2021 when the Brexit transition period came to an end, but the failure of UK governments to prepare border inspection posts meant they were not implemented at that time and have been delayed three times in the subsequent 28 months.

Speaking in response to the news that Prime Minister Boris Johnson was considering a fourth delay, FUW President Glyn Roberts said: “EU countries got their act together and started implementing full checks on our exports from the UK on 1 January 2021.

“Yet despite it being more than five years since Theresa May announced that the UK Government intended to pursue a hard Brexit policy, and that such border checks would be needed, the UK is still not ready.

“It’s a global disgrace, as it means we are failing to implement checks on international trade that should be standard practice in order to protect our own industries and population.”

Mr Roberts said that the Government’s failure meant Welsh and UK exporters face significant and costly checks on goods moving to the EU, but that EU products had been waived through our ports and into the UK market without checks for more than a year.

“In other words, our exports, such as Welsh lamb, face extremely costly border bureaucracy while food producers importing from the EU to the UK face nothing of the sort - the Government’s failure to prepare for their own Brexit plan may as well be deliberately aimed at undermining UK farmers and producers,” said Mr Roberts.

UK food and drink exports in 2021 were 12 per cent below 2020 levels and 16 per cent below 2019 levels - with falls for certain food products such as lamb far greater - mainly as a result of the checks imposed on UK exports entering the EU and associated costs.

By contrast, neighbouring EU countries have instigated far more thorough preparations, allowing them to implement full border checks when the transition period ended on 31 December 2020.

Mr Roberts added: “It is highly embarrassing and a disgrace that while other countries were able to prepare for and implement plans for a Brexit they didn’t want over just a couple of years, those who instigated Brexit have failed over a period of more than five years to implement an essential feature of what they wanted.”