“It’s a monumental white elephant, just painted black,” says Gerald Vernon-Jackson, Portsmouth city council’s cabinet member for transport, standing outside the £23m warehouse, which was completed two years ago.
The 8,000 sq metre facility situated in Portsmouth International Port – the UK’s second busiest cross-Channel terminal – is the home to its border control post (BCP). One of more than 100 registered BCPs, it will be the place where many food and plant products coming through Portsmouth from the EU will be checked when post-Brexit import rules come in on 30 April.
