Shapps defends quarantine move
THOUSANDS of British tourists are today facing a two-week quarantine after returning home from France and the Netherlands.
It was announced on Thursday night that people arriving in the UK from the two countries after 4am today will be required to spend 14 days in self-isolation due to rising numbers of coronavirus cases there.
Tourists in France were being charged hundreds of pounds to return home before the quarantine restrictions came into force.
Air fares were more than six times higher than normal for flights from Paris to London, with the cheapest British Airways tickets being sold for £452.
The lowest priced Eurostar tickets available yesterday morning were £210.
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps insisted the Government had taken “a practical approach” to the new restrictions.
The quarantine conditions will also apply to travellers returning from Monaco, Malta, Turks & Caicos and Aruba.
Mr Shapps said an estimated 160,000 holidaymakers had been expected to try to return to the UK from France yesterday.
There “had to be a cut-off”, he told BBC
Breakfast. “It’s a practical approach as well, which has enabled all fours parts of the United Kingdom – Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England – to implement the same time at 4am where there are no flights in the air, at least tomorrow.”
He added: “You can always argue one way or the other. We have to make a decision on it and we have to do that based on science and medicine, and that’s what we’ve done, we’ve taken the advice and implemented on that basis.”
The move, which applies throughout the UK, comes after Boris Johnson promised to be “absolutely ruthless” in decisions about imposing new quarantine restrictions.
The Joint Biosecurity Centre and Public
Health England detected a significant change in Covid-19 risk in all six destinations.
Department for Transport officials said data from France shows that over the past week there has been a 66% increase in newly reported Covid-19 cases and a 52% increase in the weekly incidence rate per 100,000 population, indicating a sharp rise in infections.
The latest 14-day cumulative figures from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control show 32.1 coronavirus cases per 100,000 people in France, compared with 18.5 in the UK.
The move will come as a bitter blow to the French tourism industry which relies heavily on visitors from the UK.
France’s secretary of state for European affairs said the UK decision would lead to “reciprocal measures” across the Channel.
The decision to add the Netherlands was made after a 52% increase in newly reported cases between August 7 and 13.
Over the past week, there has been a 273% increase in newly reported cases in Turks & Caicos, a 1,106% increase in Aruba and a 105% rise in Malta.