PATEL PUSHES AHEAD WITH QUARANTINE
PRITI PATEL came under fire from MPs yesterday as she unveiled quarantine laws that will force all UK arrivals to self-isolate for 14 days from Monday.
The home secretary insisted the measure is ‘essential to save lives’ but admitted it will hit businesses hard – and confirmed ‘travel corridors’ are being considered to low-infection countries.
In a statement to the Commons, Ms Patel said the proposal would be reviewed in three weeks.
A breach of self-isolation could result in a £1,000 fixed penalty notice in England or potential prosecution.
As well as facing demands from the opposition to produce scientific advice backing her proposals, Ms Patel was told by MPs that the government needed to think again.
Many demanded to know why the measures hadn’t been introduced earlier when infections were much higher in Europe – and there was bemusement it was being brought in now, when Britain has more cases than neighbouring countries.
Ms Patel said quarantine was necessary as the transmission rate in the UK was continuing to decline, while international travel was likely to pick up.
‘Therefore, the scientific advice is that imported cases of the virus pose a more significant threat to our national effort,’ she said.
‘Travellers from overseas could become a higher proportion of the overall number of infections in the UK and increase the spread of the disease.’
Labour’s shadow home secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds said: ‘There has to be reassurance that quarantine has a genuine public health benefit that, according to the government, it did not have in past months, and that this is not just a three-week fudge to try to spare it embarrassment for failing to grip this issue at the right time.’
Tory ex-international trade secretary Liam Fox said the measure would plunge the UK into ‘unnecessary economic isolation’ while the public health benefits were unclear. ‘If it is a contingency measure against a so-called second wave, why apply it to countries with a lower infection than we already have?’ he added.
Meanwhile, Portugal’s foreign minister said his country is in discussions with the UK about ‘air bridges’.
Augusto Santos Silva told the BBC that ‘our diplomats will work together in order to guarantee that British tourists coming to Portugal would not be subjected on their return to England to any kind of quarantine’.