Quarantine travellers ‘had rights breached’
TRAVELLERS from red-list countries forced to quarantine in hotels are suing the Government for hundreds of millions of pounds, claiming it breached their human rights.
Lawyers have lodged a legal claim saying those who were fully vaccinated and then tested negative for Covid-19 were ‘unlawfully deprived of their liberty’.
They want the Government to refund the around £2,000 per person fees of double jabbed and Covid-negative travellers, plus also pay out compensation to those held against their will and in poor conditions.
Around 100,000 people have arrived in the UK from red-list countries and been forced to quarantine in Government-approved hotels for ten days since February, meaning that, if successful, the claim could top £200million.
Many arrivals have complained of ‘prison-like’ conditions at the hotels, which are patrolled by security guards, and documented terrible meals delivered to ‘poky’ rooms that have poor ventilation and windows they cannot open.
Tom Goodhead, managing partner at law firm PGMBM, which is spearheading the action, said: ‘The Government hasn’t yet realised that this policy is a fundamental breach of people’s human rights. Law abiding citizens who have been double vaccinated should be free from quarantine.
‘The idea that they need to pay for the privilege of their own imprisonment is outrageous.
‘The people that are contacting us for help every day are not reckless globetrotters. They are typically people who have been forced to travel to care for relatives or attend funerals of parents or siblings. To then force them into what (has been) described as ‘worse than a prison’ is not only reprehensible but also unlawful.’
One man, from Oxford, contacted lawyers after his NHS doctor wife was forced to quarantine in an unventilated hotel room for ten days. The medic had worked throughout the pandemic in A&E and intensive care treating patients with Covid-19 and was eventually given time off to visit her family in India.
He said: ‘My wife needed to see her parents and grandparents in India for many reasons. Her grandparents are old now and she thought it was the last chance she would get. She also needed the break – her mental health had suffered.
‘We knew that she would have to quarantine when she got back and she weighed that into her decision to go. But what she didn’t anticipate was the conditions.’
Mr Goodhead said other European countries refused to introduce hotel quarantine because they realised that the detention of people without a confirmed infection or who were fully vaccinated was likely to be a breach of the ‘right to liberty’ under Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
He said it was ‘unjustified’ for someone who was double jabbed, had travelled from a red-list country and tested negative to be held, while those from amber-list countries could be released from self-isolation at home with a negative test after day five if unvaccinated or exempt from isolation entirely if they were doubled jabbed, unless they tested positive two days after their return.
Red-list returners have to take tests on day two and day eight of their hotel quarantine.
The claim will be lodged with the High Court in London today.
‘Pay for their own imprisonment’