Quarantine family’s £3k ordeal

A FAMILY forced to pay almost £3,000 to quarantine at a hotel have told of their ordeal while confined in a tiny room with their young son.

Nikki and Stephen Connelly are at present isolating at the Holiday Inn Express in Glasgow with their five-year-old son Lewis.

The family, from Perthshire, flew to Scotland from the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday as they are moving home. But Mrs Connelly, 42, said the £2,725 room they have been given for their ten days – which they estimate is only 13ft by 16ft – has ‘absolutely no space’.

‘We have been really shocked,’ she said. ‘When we first arrived there was no bed for Lewis, so we phoned down and they said it’s a sofa bed, which is fine. But when we pulled it out I could see why they hadn’t made it up – because we could not get in.

‘The bathroom is just a shower room where we are expected to wash our dishes as well. We had to have our luggage taken away because there isn’t room to store it. There is nowhere to sit and eat a meal, there is no fridge.’

Despite the ‘ludicrous’ situation, Mrs Connelly said: ‘The staff have been fantastic – it’s the actual quarantine I object to and the huge sum of money we have had to pay.’ The couple, who are double-vaccinated, think they should be allowed to isolate at their home, especially as travel loopholes mean they could have elected to travel via an amber-list country.

Mrs Connelly said Lewis was ‘frustrated’ at being cooped up indoors, while they had to send their two daughters ahead as unaccompanied minors, which meant they do not have to quarantine – and saving the family from having to pay a £5,000 bill.

The Scottish Government said: ‘We have every sympathy with the Connelly family... however, the rules around international travel are in place to limit the risk of importing new cases and variants and there are very limited exemptions to the quarantine rules.’