Drivers heading to France have been told to expect more traffic chaos on 'Black Saturday', and to delay journeys until tomorrow if possible.

However, the Port of Dover reported this morning that traffic in the area is currently flowing freely.

Today marks the end of the July holiday for many French families and the start of the August one for others, which normally brings extremely high levels of traffic expected to add to tailbacks on this side of the Channel too.

Last weekend motorists coming in to the Port of Dover suffered delays of up to 12 hours and 250,000 were stuck.

Understaffing at French border controls, which were carrying out heightened security checks following the recent terror attack in Nice, has been blamed for the delays.

However Dover and Deal MP Charlie Elphicke was also highly critical of Highways England, the Port of Dover and the relevant government departments, telling them to "get a grip" on the "completely unacceptable" situation.

Traffic returned to normal in the week, but with thousands of holidaymakers expected to head towards the port today and a 'Black Saturday' anticipated in France, a number of organisations have warned them to expect delays.

The AA has advised people to avoid travelling today and instead go tomorrow if possible.

Kent County Council (KCC) has advised motorists to take food and drink with them and to check with travel operators before making their trips.

It has also warned that the congestion may have a knock-on effect to the surrounding area, but Matthew Balfour, KCC cabinet member for environment and transport, said it had done all it could to help last weekend and was prepared for issues today.

“Whilst it won’t comfort those who were held up, everyone involved in managing the situation worked around the clock to minimise the delays as far as possible," he said.

“Kent County Council headed up the welfare aspect of responding to the situation and delivered thousands of bottles of water over the two days. We are fully stocked and prepared should the need arise again.”

The AA's advice not to travel today is more to do with fears over traffic in France than Kent, and Ian Crowder, an AA spokesman, was hopeful queues in to Dover would be less severe this weekend.

He said: "My understanding is that the French security authorities, the border staff, have increased their presence so the chances of the kinds of delays that we saw last weekend - utter chaos - that really should never happen again.

"I think that steps have been taken to ensure that it doesn't happen again, however it's important that travellers planning to go to France should allow plenty of additional time for their journey.

"The days of simply being waved through are over, and I'm sure most people appreciate the reasons for it."

Yesterday, highways chiefs told how they had set aside more than 30,000 bottles of water to cope with any repeat of last weekend's problems.

Last Saturday the delays affected both A20 and A2 east-bound where traffic was queuing to get to the port.

The A20 was even closed at one stage to allow bottled water to be handed out to those who were stranded, and temporary toilets were also put in place between the port and the Roundhill tunnels at Folkestone.

Many holidaymakers, some of whom had to sleep in their cars on Friday night, took to Twitter to complain whilst traffic throughout Dover was busy all weekend as a knock-on result.