UK may lift quarantine for ‘low risk’ Aussies

AUSTRALIANS may be exempt from a 14-day quarantine on entry into the UK.

The success of Australia’s containment of COVID-19, where only 101 people have died, has been hailed as a sign that it would be safe for the UK to allow Australians more travel rights.

It is understood there has been debate in the UK cabinet about whether to give Australians a free pass when the quarantine begins — expected to be in early June.

Some were strongly of the view that Australia should be granted an exemption, while others did not want to add confusion into the system.

Australia’s Tourism Minister Simon Birmingham said there were no plans to ease Australia’s border restrictions.

“We welcome any recognition that Australia has led the world in the successful containment of COVID-19, which clearly means that travellers coming from Australia would pose a low risk to the rest of the world,” he said.

BRITISH Prime Minister Boris Johnson has instructed civil servants to make plans to end the UK’s reliance on China for vital medical supplies and other strategic imports in light of the coronavirus outbreak, The

Times reports.

The plans include identifying Britain’s main economic vulnerabilities to potentially hostile foreign governments as part of a broader new approach to national security.

The paper said the aim was to diversify supply lines to no longer depend on individual countries for essentials.