The Covid-19 pandemic in the UK was accelerated in the early months by critical errors in the Government’s approach to border measures which led to many more people contracting Covid-19, the Home Affairs Committee has found .
In its report on Home Office preparedness for COVID-19 (coronavirus): management of the borders,
The cross-party report says Government is right to include Spain in the current quarantine arrangements but criticises handling and calls for improvements in way travel corridor decisions are made.
The inquiry considered all of the Government’s decisions on border measures – from the early quarantine of 273 people largely from Wuhan, through the voluntary self-isolation measures applied to travellers from specific countries (including China, Iran and Italy) in February and early March followed by the lifting of all border measures on 13 March, to the introduction of mandatory quarantine in June, followed by travel corridors and the most recent decision to reintroduce quarantine for Spain.
Drawing on evidence that thousands of people with Covid-19 arrived in or returned to the UK in February and March, the Committee concludes that the UK’s experience of Covid-19 has been far worse as a result of the Government’s decision not to require quarantine during March, which would have reduced the number of imported infections.
The Committee is particularly critical of the Government’s decision on 13 March to remove all self-isolation guidance for travellers arriving in the UK at a time when other comparable countries were strengthening their border measures, and when hundreds of new Covid cases were arriving every day – particularly from Spain, Italy and France, including many British residents returning home.
The Committee was unable to find any scientific evidence to justify this inexplicable decision and says that the failure to have any special border measures in place in mid March was a serious error. It also found that the decision not to include Spain in the earlier country specific measures in late February was a mistake as doing so could have slowed the virus spread.
The report welcomes the introduction of border measures this summer, supports the development of travel corridors and the application of quarantine requirements for arrivals from Spain given the current rising number of infections there. But it is very critical of the handling and communication of the decision to remove the travel corridor with Spain and warns that the Government needs to be much more sensitive to the impact on families and businesses. It calls for publication of the Joint Biosecurity Centre’s traffic light assessment of different countries so that people can better judge the risk before travelling. It criticises the lack of earlier warnings about the potential risks of travel and the mixed messages from Government, with Ministers welcoming air corridors on 8 July as “good news for holiday makers.”
The Committee recognises the difficulties the Government has faced in responding swiftly to the unprecedented challenges from Covid-19, and also recognises that border measures are only part of the response to the pandemic. But given the changing global pattern of the pandemic it says border measures will be needed for some time, so scrutiny is important to ensure the most effective measures are put in place at the right time.
Publishing the report, Chair of the Committee Rt Hon Yvette Cooper MP said:
“Covid-19 is a global pandemic, so all countries need to be able to use border measures at different times to prevent it spreading and to save lives – the consequences of failing to do so are very serious for both public health and the economy.
The Government’s failure to have proper quarantine measures in place in March as the infection was spreading fast was a grave error and meant Covid spread faster and reached more people. The UK was almost unique in having no border checks or quarantine arrangements at that time. That alone should have rung loud alarm bells for Ministers and made them think again.
Many times Ministers told us they were following the science, but we cannot find any science at all behind their completely inexplicable decision to lift all the self isolation guidance for travellers on 13 March a full ten days before lockdown, just at a time when other countries were introducing stronger border measures. We were told that thousands more people with Covid-19 came back to the UK after that guidance was lifted. So in the middle of March, at a time when the number of people with Covid coming back into the UK was at its peak, they were going back to work or onto public transport or seeing family without any quarantine in place.
We are concerned that border measures just weren’t taken seriously enough at the beginning of the crisis, either in the discussions among scientific advisers or in Ministerial decision making. It appears Ministers took decisions without critical information they should have had, and it has been extremely difficult to work out who took key decisions and on what basis.
Given that mistakes were made at the beginning, the Government has been right to learn lessons and to reintroduce border measures including applying quarantine for arrivals from Spain as infections are rising. But it was very unhelpful for Ministers to describe the travel corridors as “good news for holiday makers” when they were announced as the mixed messages meant people booked holidays in Spain in good faith and now are put in a really difficult position. The Government needs to be much more sensitive to the impact on families and businesses of last-minute decisions like this, and it needs to publish much more information including a proper traffic lights system so that people can see what the risks are.
In an unprecedented public health crisis, the Government inevitably faces very difficult decisions. But they would be much more effective with greater transparency and trust. Publishing the science and evidence behind their decisions would mean they benefit both from greater scrutiny and debate to get those decisions right, and also from greater trust, understanding and support.”
