Travellers to be f ined £5k if they go abroad for holiday
TRAVELLERS will be hit with a £5,000 fine for going abroad on holiday, ministers announced last night.
A ban on leaving the UK without a ‘reasonable excuse’, such as work or a limited range of other reasons, will come into force in England and Wales from Monday.
The Department for Health said any decision on similar fines north of the Border would be a matter for the Scottish Government.
The move – unveiled on the anniversary of the first coronavirus lockdown – will be a huge blow for the tourism industry, which has already been battered by the pandemic.
The threat of fines will remain in place until the end of June under new official regulations.
It came as it emerged quarantinefree holidays may not be possible until August, killing off hopes of trips abroad until late summer.
Many countries popular with British holidaymakers could remain offlimits until then due to surging Covid infections and cases of new variants in Europe, sources said.
Under current Covid-19 restrictions, it is illegal for people in Scotland to travel abroad for holidays and other leisure purposes.
People can only travel abroad if they have an essential reason to do so, such as travelling for certain types of work.
Passengers arriving in Scotland on international flights are required to undergo a 14-day period of isolation at a quarantine hotel.
France looks likely to be added to the UK Government’s travel ban ‘red list’ of countries by the end of the week, sources said.
There are currently 35 countries on the UK’s red list, including the whole of South America, southern Africa, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. Portugal was on the list but was removed last week.
Anyone entering Britain after visiting one of these nations must quarantine in a Governmentapproved hotel at their own expense for ten days.
Ministers and health officials are increasingly concerned by rising cases of the South African variant in France, which is also seeing a surge in overall infections.
Last week up to 2,000 cases of the mutant strain were detected in the country, representing around 7 per cent of all cases.
One Government minister even suggested that the UK may have to put the whole of the Continent on the red list amid its botched vaccine rollout.
Sources stressed no decision has yet been made on when holidays abroad will be possible, but that it may well not be until late summer.
Ministers are considering plans for a ‘traffic light’ system to kick-start holidays, only allowing tourists restriction-free travel to ‘green’ countries without the need for quarantine on return.
UK Transport Secretary Grant Shapps is leading a task force which is considering the terms and will report to Prime Minister Boris Johnson on April 12 about how and when the ban on non-essential travel can safely be lifted.
It can be no sooner than May 17 under Mr Johnson’s road map.
Similarly, the Scottish Government said the rules on foreign travel will not change until May 17 at the earliest and possibly will not change until ‘some time after’ that date.
The task force may set out a series of tests that have to be met, linked to vaccination rates and other indicators, rather than fix dates for when travel can resume.
Yesterday Care Minister Helen Whately became the second Government minister in as many days to warn that booking a holiday abroad would be ‘premature’.
But top scientists and Government advisers yesterday backed foreign holidays being allowed this summer.
Carl Heneghan, professor of evidence-based medicine at Oxford University’s Nuffield Department of Primary Care, accused ministers of ‘speculating always to the worstcase scenario’.
He said: ‘We were allowing people to go on holiday last summer, without any testing programme, and now we have got the vaccination programme and the testing programme. Given that, you have to ask the question, “what will it take if that’s not sufficient?”’
‘Always worst-case scenario’