An MP has warned the UK risks importing poisoned and contaminated food if more stringent checks aren't carried out at a Kent port.

The government has been urged to reconsider its decision to mothball a facility at Dover, which had been set to inspect food, plant and animal goods coming into the country, to make sure they meet stringent UK requirements.

Dover MP Natalie Elphicke raised the issue in a debate at Westminster to draw attention to the continuing challenge of minimising the health risks associated with food imports.

She quoted a recent report by the Dover Port Health Authority on an exercise carried out to test the adequacy of border controls. That highlighted the lack of controls on food products coming into the port.

Checks on 22 lorries had discovered raw animal products - some dripping with blood - loosely stored in carrier bags and paper tissue.

She said: "These products were not separated from ready-to-eat products.

“Biosecurity at the border is not secure…the port health authority has said greater mitigation is needed to control the risk of African swine fever entering the UK.

"The port authority says it has been left in limbo without direction or appropriate engagement.

"Can the minister say when controls, facilities and staff will be put in place to tackle the risk that more poisonous food and dangerous goods and biosecurity risks coming in to the UK?"

The Dover Port Health Authority was supposed to relocate to state-of-the-art inspection facilities in Whitfield.

But HM Revenue & Customs announced it would not be building an Inland Border Facility at White Cliff's Business Park. after a review showed existing facilities had enough capacity to deal with the flow of traffic.

That decision came just weeks after work had begun on the site.

But Ms Elphicke said the Cabinet Office was wrong in its assertion that little or no border infrastructure was needed because of digital processes.

She asked: "Does the government recognise that the digital world will not stop the real world from gaming the system and that is why physical borders will always be needed.

"Digital borders can absolutely help improve the efficiency of physical borders but they cannot replace them.

"The smuggling of illegal goods and people is rife at Dover and shocking. It is time for the government to confront these dangers and bring them to an end and restore order.

"That includes a review of the decision to mothball the Dover Port health facility and reinvestment in port health staff."

The MP said the new port health facility at Dover was fitted out, fully ready for border checks. It was ready to go live, with extra staff recruited but was unexpectedly mothballed in the summer by the then Brexit Opportunities Minister.

'The smuggling of illegal goods and people is rife at Dover and shocking'

That was in spite of the Cabinet Office receiving a shocking report from Dover’s port health authority in May, ahead of the decision, about poisonous food and serious biosecurity concerns.

The report said: “To not mobilise the facility would be an act of negligence that would significantly increase the risk of devastating consequences of another animal, health or food safety catastrophe.”

Cabinet Office Parliamentary Secretary Brendan Clarke-Smith responded that the government would devise a regime that would best suit the UK's needs and would be "safe, secure and efficient."

In a statement, Dover council said Dover Port Health Authority, which is provided by the council, had expressed serious concerns regarding the mitigation of biosecurity risks at the port, including concerns that a new port health facility in Dover has not yet opened.

"The authority wrote to the then Prime Minister in May raising a number of urgent issues, including the very significant increase in non-compliant imported food, an increase in the risk of a national food safety and/or biosecurity incident. It also raised evidence of deliberate food fraud."