Travel industry fury as government dithers over air bridge plans

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