Leading business groups tell UK ministers to sort out the “baffling” array of post-Brexit rules that threaten the UK's export trade to the EU.

British manufacturing and trade organisations met Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove in an emergency session on Thursday (January 7), calling for ministers to restart trade negotiations with Brussels immediately.

One leading figure, James Withers (@scotfoodjames), CEO of Scotland Food and Drink, wrote on Twitter: "More messages from food exporters who are finding the door to the EU is now shut. Haulage firms won’t take their loads; bureaucratic/IT systems failing. A multi-billion pound trade system is being tested for the 1st time, in real time. And it’s going wrong."

In another tweet, Withers wrote: "The pain of Brexit this week will be much less visual than many expect. It is unlikely to be the queues of lorries on motorways or on airport runways in Kent. It will be the pain of what is NOT happening: cancelled orders and EU customers starting to go elsewhere for their goods."

Timelapse footage from December 31 shows the Port of Dover in Kent, England, as the Brexit transition ended.

Afternoon timelapse of the Port of Dover, in Kent, England, UK, the nearest English port to mainland Europe