UK looking to build air bridges - reciprocal arrangements with a number of European countries whereby their residents will be allowed free access without quarantine. ITV reports:
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said air bridges would only be agreed with countries which have a coronavirus test and trace system of the same standard as that used in Britain.
Rather brave of him, considering that the UK test and trace efforts have been an utter fiasco - too little, too late, and contracts given to the wrong people. Not expected to be functional before September, and government announcements alternate between non-credible numbers and frank admissions that the government has no idea how many people have been tested. While the trace half of the equation is sheer fantasyland.
One would have thought, under the circumstances, that Shapps might have wished to qualify his statement by saying that air bridges would only be agreed with countries that have a coronavirus test and trace system of the same standard OR BETTER than that used in Britain. In any case the difficulty is going to be finding countries desperate enough for tourists that they agree to pair with a country whose current rate of infection is far higher than any of the EU countries.
The real reason for the eagerness to pair is not that the UK sees itself as desirable holiday territory at the moment. Rather that UK (well, mostly English - but that’s another story) citizens are hoping to holiday in Mediterranean countries without having to go into quarantine when they return. Many of the sort who crowded Bournemouth Beach this weekend simply want the old life back at any price.
*Note: have been complaints that photo used compressed lens. Photo credit to the Telegraph. Not a tabloid and usually only guilty of right wing bias. 🤔
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said air bridges would only be agreed with countries which have a coronavirus test and trace system of the same standard as that used in Britain.
Rather brave of him, considering that the UK test and trace efforts have been an utter fiasco - too little, too late, and contracts given to the wrong people. Not expected to be functional before September, and government announcements alternate between non-credible numbers and frank admissions that the government has no idea how many people have been tested. While the trace half of the equation is sheer fantasyland.
One would have thought, under the circumstances, that Shapps might have wished to qualify his statement by saying that air bridges would only be agreed with countries that have a coronavirus test and trace system of the same standard OR BETTER than that used in Britain. In any case the difficulty is going to be finding countries desperate enough for tourists that they agree to pair with a country whose current rate of infection is far higher than any of the EU countries.
The real reason for the eagerness to pair is not that the UK sees itself as desirable holiday territory at the moment. Rather that UK (well, mostly English - but that’s another story) citizens are hoping to holiday in Mediterranean countries without having to go into quarantine when they return. Many of the sort who crowded Bournemouth Beach this weekend simply want the old life back at any price.
*Note: have been complaints that photo used compressed lens. Photo credit to the Telegraph. Not a tabloid and usually only guilty of right wing bias. 🤔