Traffic-light systems the short-lived amber-plus category, which so decimated family holidays to France (despite seemingly being driven by caseloads in the French protectorate of Réunion Island) self-isolation from ten days, to five, to three and many other spur-of-the-moment policies combined to deliver one of the largest ever assaults on the travel and tourism sector. Such policies were made up on a whim, with one minister telling me once that “they’d fixed Greece for me” when I queried how they were deciding the policy of whether a country was in the quarantine list or not. Filling in a Passenger Locator Form ( Alamy) All in the height of summer, when travel is at its peak and tourism businesses have at least a shot at turning a profit. That was followed by the same approach for those returning from France (36 hours’ notice), then other countries. We saw the enormous financial and emotional stress on travellers as, in July 2020, the government introduced a quarantine on those returning from Spain with just 24 hours’ notice. More badly thought-through policies were to follow. Travel industry groups emerged, such as Quash Quarantine, to oppose a policy which put off millions of people not only from travelling abroad but also from contemplating choosing the UK for a business or leisure trip.
Remember the Home Office quarantine policy, described as “daft” and “hare-brained” in the Sunday Times, which was introduced as Covid cases were dramatically falling across the UK? This forced anyone travelling to the UK from a country not on the “safe” list to endure a mandatory 14 days of quarantine, initially at home but later in a hotel with poor-quality food and the odd cockroach thrown in for good measure. Main photo: Chicago O’Hare International Airport (Alamy) A traveller shows a Passenger Locator Form on his phone at Brussels airport ( Getty Images) The demise of these Covid measures is unalloyed good news for a travel and tourism sector that has been on the receiving end of some ludicrous government decisions since early 2020. The PLF will go into long-overdue retirement at 4am on March 18, the government announced on Monday, joined by the requirement for unvaccinated arrivals aged 18 and over to take a day two PCR test on arrival. “No one collects them, nobody checks them or follows up on them,” said Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary last week, in a statement that few who’ve laboured over the head-scratchingly illogical form since the resumption of travel would contest. The chief offender: the much-despised and maligned Passenger Locator Form (PLF), complete with its incomprehensible questions about when you intend to leave your home once back in it after a holiday. Rejoice! The final vestiges of the many and spurious Covid border controls that have so dominated - and ruined - travel since the beginning of the pandemic are to be scrapped.
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