Mr. Eamonn O'Reilly:

We have been involved for over two and a half years. We were very active in the lead up to Brexit in trying to make sure there was enough infrastructure in place. We liaised with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. We ran seminars a long time ago for hauliers, IBEC and so forth.

In terms of the difficulties hauliers have had, there was a significant amount unpreparedness among cargo owners, those who owned the goods and had to get them moved by hauliers on ships through ports. I have seen it in the spaces on shelves in one or two of the larger UK retailers in Ireland, food and otherwise. There was a significant lack of preparedness. I saw a manifest for a trailer from an internationally known work vehicle company. It was an enormously complex manifest of items which had been presented to a customs agent with three hours notice.

It was anticipated all of this would be cleared for the sum of €25 with three hours before the trailer was supposed to board the ship. This practical example showed a very sophisticated operation, which is very large financially and is internationally known, was entirely unprepared for the realities of the non-tariff barriers that Brexit reintroduced and for tariff barriers that have arisen because of the origin of trade rules.

In terms of what we can do to facilitate the flow of goods through the port and prevent delays for hauliers, much of what is left to do, which is within our power, has been done already. This has been done through the provision of infrastructure and upgrading of the port road network. It depends now on industry, in particular the cargo owners. When operating border controls which we have had many years' notice of, it falls to them to make sure all of the provisions of European law on sanitary and phytosanitary, SPS, customs and so forth, are complied with through the Revenue and through the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine.