Priti Patel announces new 14-day quarantine plans

Speaking yesterday (Friday 22nd May), the Home Secretary put forward her new plan to put arrivals into a 14 day quarantine in an attempt to stop a second wave.

While the Labour Party have supported the move, numerous issues shroud the plan. Boris Johnson's government has recently come under fire for not being tough enough on new arrivals during the height of the pandemic. From late January checks were placed on those arriving from Hubei Province, the suspected origin of the virus.

Those exempt from the quarantine are those arriving from the Republic of Ireland, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands, freight drivers, seasonal agricultural workers and medical professionals. The french government has reacted with a similar move against those arriving from the UK from the 8th of June.

While similar measures have been enforced across the European continent earlier in the year, the UK government has been slow to step up restrictions. In February arrivals from Italy were told to self-isolate, but this wasn't enforced. Many are obviously wondering - why is it now that these steps are introduced, but worse still, not enacted for another two weeks?

Take Greece, for example. Greece have been testing arrivals and putting them up in a hotel while the results come back. Greece certainly has its fair share of visitors, and they've been testing them. Meanwhile our government still falls short of the '100,000' tests a day, three weeks after the day they said it would be done (presumably on a daily basis). Greece can do this despite the economic stress the country has been under since the financial crash.

Economic consequences from this could be considerable - The British Chambers of Commerce have noted the blanket quarantine will "damage international business and investor confidence at a time when it is vital to demonstrate that the UK can open for business safely" (Reuters). Indeed Spain plans to end its own similar restrictions in June, paving the way for the industry to recover after these tumultuous months, but I ask why is it only now these measures are put in place? Furthermore, where is the long-term exit strategy?