May 23rd - Answering Your Questions
Simon Calder's Independent Travel Podcast
The Independent
3.6 • 628 Ratings
🗓️ 23 May 2021
⏱️ 11 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today I'm tackling three questions:
Why can unvaccinated people from Portugal come to the UK, but vaccinated visitors from the US cannot?
How much notice will those in amber destinations get to return home if that country is put on the red list while there?
Why has easyJet cancelled almost all its flights to Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands for June?
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Mm, picnic. What does one take to a picnic? Crisps, dips, sausage rolls. No, come on, think outside the box. |
| 0:11.2 | Mm, napkins? What are you, the mum? No, something a bit more exciting. Something like, I'll have those red scratch cards please. Add some play with National |
| 0:25.6 | Lottery Scratch cards. Search Dream big, play small rules and procedures apply. Players must be 18 or over. |
| 0:32.3 | Hello and thanks for joining me. It's Sunday the 23rd of May and here's the very latest on travel and destinations from the green list. |
| 0:41.2 | Today I'm picking up three questions all to do with the government's traffic light system that I hope will shine some red amber and green lights on changes this summer. |
| 0:51.5 | The podcast is completely free but if you want to support us, please |
| 0:55.7 | subscribe to my new weekly travel email, Simon called us Travel Week, also free, and you can |
| 1:01.9 | sign up at independent.co.uk forward slash newsletters. Now, Rachel asks, could the government give us a clear rationale as to why my fully |
| 1:15.4 | vaccinated or tested American friends and family can't come to my wedding in the UK in July, |
| 1:23.3 | but unvaccinated people from Portugal can. |
| 1:34.3 | Well, Portugal is the only major country on the green list that British people can reasonably go to. |
| 1:40.3 | The US is on the Amber list, along with the vast majority of other nations, |
| 1:45.4 | and that means that they are perfectly welcome to come to the UK. |
| 1:49.8 | They wouldn't be from a redlist country, but they are from the US. |
| 1:52.4 | But they need to take a test before departure. |
| 1:57.2 | They'll need to pre-book two PCR tests on day two and day eight of their stay. |
| 2:02.9 | They need to go straight into self-isolation when they get here and they can take an extra test after five days, which would allow them to get out and enjoy your wedding as long as it's negative. |
| 2:09.8 | That's a very different position from anyone who's in Portugal now. They can come to the UK. |
| 2:15.0 | They'll still have to have a test before they bought a plane. |
| 2:22.0 | They'll still have to fill in a form. They still have to book one PCR test when they arrive. |
| 2:28.2 | But they will be allowed in. And that's a reflection of relative infection rates. |
| 2:35.8 | It's also a reflection of the fact that the UK government is simply not interested in anybody's test results. |
... |
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