MS, Deputy First Minister and Cabinet
Secretary for Climate Change and Rural Affairs: The Border Target
Operating Model, including arrangements agreed by the UK, Welsh
and Scottish governments to protect our biosecurity and food
safety, was published in August 2023. It set out the
post-Brexit requirements of border controls on imports from the
EU, including that live animals and goods such as foodstuffs
could only be imported through a point of entry with a border
control post (BCP).
In line with those arrangements, the Welsh Government
commissioned construction of a BCP on our land at Parc Cybi in
March 2024 to ensure that Holyhead - the busiest ferry port on
the Irish Sea, with over three quarters of imports to Great
Britain from Ireland - would be able to continue to
operate. As with BCPs around Great Britain, HM Treasury
provided funding for construction – in Holyhead's case, £44m out
of a cost of £51m incurred up to the end of 2024-25. Construction
of Holyhead BCP is now nearing completion, and the building is
expected to be handed over to Welsh Government this autumn.
In May 2025, the UK Government announced a Common Understanding
with the European Union (EU) with a view to negotiating a ‘Common
Sanitary and Phytosanitary Area' that could, if agreed, exempt
many imports of live animals and goods from sanitary and
phytosanitary (SPS) checks at the border. Details of the
agreement are still to be negotiated. We remain engaged
with colleagues in the UK Government who are leading these
negotiations, and with colleagues in the Scottish Government and
Northern Ireland Executive. We are also committed to ensuring an
acceptable level of biosecurity protection over the interim
period whilst the agreement is negotiated and implemented.
The Senedd will recall that, although physical and identity
checks on imports from the EU began on 30 April 2024, no start
date has ever been announced for SPS checks on imports from
Ireland. I have decided not to proceed with the final
commissioning and staffing of the Holyhead BCP, and not to take
forward construction of BCPs at Fishguard and Pembroke
Dock. I will keep that decision under review until the
final details of the agreement with the EU are known. We
will then be able to make longer-term plans for the Holyhead
site. In the meantime, it is crucial that it remains ready
and available as a potential BCP facility.
The Welsh Government remains committed to providing sufficient
notice for traders and delivery partners should any new border
checks need to be introduced.
The need for new border control facilities across Great Britain
flows directly from the original decision to withdraw from the
EU. The costs associated with maintaining the Holyhead facility
in a state of readiness, without commissioning it for border
control functions, are a result of ongoing UK-EU discussions on
the SPS agreements. These discussions stem from the original
decision to withdraw from the EU.
