The politician in charge of Kent's roads says delays and disruption to travellers crossing the English Channel could be resolved by relocating the Port of Dover to a larger site.

Cllr David Brazier, the Conservative cabinet member for highways at Kent County Council (KCC), has taken to task his own government over the way it has responded to recent events at the port, and says Operation Brock is a traffic management system of limited value.

Meanwhile, Dover MP Natalie Elphicke has renewed calls for a lorry park in the county to mitigate traffic gridlock - an idea that has previously been considered but dropped.

Asked about alternative ways of managing queues and dealing with chronic transport congestion, Cllr Brazier told the 'Paul On Politics' show on KMTV: "The government is not pulling its weight. I have said before there is no question to which Operation Brock is the answer.

"It is a traffic management system that KCC and the resilience forum can make work. But what is needed is major investment - not on the highway - to get the traffic through the ports and on to France. That is where it all goes wrong."

Cllr Brazier says one solution would be to carry out passport and other checks somewhere off-site between Dover and Folkestone.

“Another way would be to close the Port of Dover and build it somewhere sensible, not on the edge of a town," he said.

"We talk to government very, very often and they have no answers at the moment - at least not that they are talking to the county council about.”

Asked why the government has failed to initiate other proposals set out by the transport secretary in a statement to Parliament in November last year, he added: “They are very slow to move, and when they do it is by no means always the right answer."

Meanwhile, Mrs Elphicke says a lorry park in Kent should be reconsidered, arguing it would have gone ahead several years ago had residents not objected.

Referencing four weeks of traffic chaos on the M20 in the summer of 2015, the Conservative MP said: "The need for a large lorry park was recognised and £250 million secured to build it..

"However, locals near the preferred location near Stanford saw off the plan. The impact of that decision continues to be felt across our area. The bottom line is that new lorry parking is needed."

The MP's call for a park puts her at odds with KCC, which has acknowledged there is a need for more lorry parks, but that they should not be built in Kent.

Labour councillor for Gravesham Shane Mochrie-Cox says there is no coherent strategy for Kent that addresss the challenges of dealing with increasing traffic.

"We need to have a long-term infrastructure plan that makes sure that not everything has to go through Dover," he said.

He also called for investment that would encourage more ports to reopen, saying that would ease the pressure on the town.