Kit Malthouse, recently installed as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, chaired the cross-department meeting, which included ministers from the Department for Transport, Home Office, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.

Ministers were also joined by senior officials from UK Border Force, the National Police Coordination Centre and the Kent Resilience Forum, which managed the local impact of last weekend’s disruption at Dover and Folkestone.

Malthouse maintained work was being done to prevent similar scenes at ports this weekend and stressed the government was “in daily contact” with the Port of Dover and French authority “to work together to remove any grit from the system”.

According to a Cabinet Office statement, ministers discussed how the government’s recent changing of regulations on airport slots had helped airlines “make sensible decisions” on flying schedules and provided passengers “with more certainty”.

With Birmingham’s Commonwealth Games beginning on Thursday (28 July) and Wednesday’s RMT rail workers on strike, ministers also examined preparations to provide alternative transport to “keep the country moving”.

Measures include putting extra capacity on train lines that are running and laying on coaches for sports fans and spectators.

The Home Office also updated ministers on “improvements” in passport application processing.

Kevin Foster MP, minister for future borders and immigration, said he had been meeting with Passport Office chiefs “on a fortnightly basis” to lower processing times, with “hundreds of extra staff” being brought in boost capacity.

The Passport Office is now processing around a million applications each month, with almost 98% being processed within 10 weeks.