With a mere 24 days to go before the UK is scheduled to leave the European Union, government ministers have been scrambling to quantify the number of potential problems each ‘exit’ scenario could create, and how they could be resolved. However, one cabinet minister has highlighted a hitherto unforeseen or at least unacknowledged catastrophe that could erupt in the event of a ‘no deal’ Brexit – an exponential rise in ‘dogging’.
Speaking at the Conservative party conference last week, an unnamed minister was quoted by The Times as saying that if major congestion plagued transport links to and from the key UK port of Dover, stalled truck drivers could end up visiting voyeuristic sex sites to alleviate the tedium.
“One of the things we talk about in these no-deal meetings concerns hauliers and their activities. The main thing is whether they will turn up at the Channel ports with the right paperwork. But there are also dogging hotspots all over the place,”the minister said.
Intriguingly, ministers were said to also believe it was more likely to be an issue with UK truckers rather than their continental counterparts.
“Do Europeans even do dogging? There is something deeply British about dogging,”the minister ruminated.
Operation Yellowhammer, a leaked government document detailing the worst case no deal scenario, envisaged a “three month meltdown” at British ports – although any departure without some kind of customs arrangement in place is likely to create delays of some kind.