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Travel industry fury as government dithers over air bridge plans

‘We cannot plan our operations on the basis of government leaks,’ said one airline CEO

Simon Calder
Travel Correspondent
Thursday 25 June 2020 20:56 BST
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New Zealand health expert criticises UK quarantine measures

As uncertainty continues over whether millions of summer holidays will go ahead, the travel industry is watching the quarantine fiasco with increasing fury.

Eight weeks after the government hatched a plan to impose quarantine on all arriving travellers, airlines and holiday companies are unable to tell customers whether or not they will be able to travel abroad in July and August.

The measure, brought in on 8 June, requires returning holidaymakers and visiting tourists to self-isolate for two weeks after arrival.

Quarantine came into effect in the UK just as Europe and other parts of the world were unlocking. Instead of the hoped-for return of bookings, British firms saw sales slump because travellers are unwilling to undergo 14 days of self-isolation.

The policy has also been criticised for actually increasing the risk to British holidaymakers, with medical experts saying they do not understand why the government would want to prevent healthy UK citizens from going to countries with lower rates of infection.

By not allowing healthy British holidaymakers to go abroad, there are more potential candidates for infection in the UK than there would otherwise be.

Sir David Skegg, a New Zealand professor of preventive and social medicine, told MPs: “From the point of view of the United Kingdom’s health system, is it going to make things better or worse? Someone could argue that if they go and spend two weeks sitting on a beach in Greece, they’re actually less likely to become infected than if they remain in the UK.

Three airlines – British Airways, easyJet and Ryanair – are challenging the government’s imposition of quarantine in court as “disproportionate” legislation that was brought in without consultation.

The transport secretary, Grant Shapps, has urged the establishment of “air bridges” or “travel corridors”: reciprocal no-quarantine deals signed with key destination countries. The chosen nations are due to be announced on 29 June.

Meanwhile, airline and tour operators are faced with a series of conflicting leaks over which destinations will be selected, and no clear sign of when the Foreign Office might ease its blanket warning against all overseas travel.

Bosses are furious with the lack of clarity.

One airline chief executive told The Independent, “We’re still in the dark about where we can expect to fly – although I doubt there will be any science behind where is chosen.

“There was no science behind the quarantine rules to begin with, after all.

“We cannot plan our operations on the basis of information leaked by the government. The suspense is nearly killing us all. ”

His words echoed those of Simon Jupp, the Conservative MP for East Devon, who told Mr Shapps at the Transport Select Committee: “This is just killing the aviation industry.”

The transport secretary responded: “I understand entirely the pain that aviation is going through.”

Paul Goldstein, co-owner of Kicheche Safari Camp in Kenya, said: “I am both intrigued and angered by Mr Shapps comically insincere remarks of ‘feeling the travel industry’s pain’ as several thousand people from this beleaguered sector are made redundant.

“It is his constant backing of this ludicrous quarantine that is causing this pain. He can help by dropping this unworkable, unenforceable and nonsensical legislation.

“It is the cynical and damaging love-child of Dominic Cummings and not based on anything, but is destroying the airline and travel sector.”

While Ryanair and easyJet are stepping up operations from 1 July, increasing the range of airports in the UK and abroad, other operators are cutting back.

Jet2, based in Leeds, has announced the cancellation of holidays to eight destinations including Nice, Verona and the Greek islands of Lesbos, Mykonos and Santorini.

A spokesperson said: “We will only take customers to destinations that are quarantine-free, so we ask the government to provide urgent clarity over air bridges so that customers can plan their holidays.”

The government will announce on Monday 29 June the initial list of travel corridors.

Rumours emerging from the Department for Transport and other parts of government suggest that France, Italy, Spain and Greece will be granted air-bridge status.

But there is uncertainty about Portugal because of recent spikes in infection in Lisbon and on the Algarve.

Various lists of the other potential “beneficiaries” of travel corridors are circulating within the travel industry, with business destinations such as Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria and Scandinavia – but probably not Sweden.

Some lists include Turkey, while others do not – and Croatia, popular with hundreds of thousands of British travellers in a normal summer, is missing from most.

Further rumours suggest that all European Union countries would be included, while some locations are baffling the industry.

The tiny Caribbean island of Montserrat has been repeatedly named, even though it has never had direct air links with the UK.

The inclusion of the Falkland Islands has also caused bemusement, given that the primary commercial means of getting there is via Brazil – which has a very high rate of coronavirus and would be a prime candidate for quarantine were the policy based on the risk to UK citizens.

The government says: “These measures are informed by science, backed by the public and will keep us all safe.”

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