NEW:
BBC has seen the official internal management data for the new post Brexit freight border - roll on roll off lorry outbound flows to EU now at 98% of last February - though was 73% in January... officials say “back to normal”...
That is reference to lorry flow rates - which is what Cabinet Office key committees most concerned about post Brexit in terms of knock on social impact for supplies of everything. Government now confident its “reasonable worst case scenario” of 7k lorries in kent won’t happen...
That is not same as saying trade has normalised - drawing on multiple sources - ferry manifests, Kent checks, french official data - the level of empty lorries on the short straits is around 50%, and was normally around 30%... ...
traffic here was 67% normal in Jan - 82% in feb
Combining those and you get to around 2000 fewer laden export trucks a day in January, still notable fall now. Officials say much was displaced into last year by stockpilers. On other hand French transport sources suggest the higher value Tunnel export empties more like 50-60%
Officials have been tracking the commodity codes on the ferry manifests and have distinguished between freight flows hit so far in 2021 by general COVID downturn - eg clothing and apparel, and post Brexit transition - agriculture, food and groupage
