Travel news latest: Government rejects calls to scrap amber list

Do you have a trip to Portugal planned, or perhaps you’re in the country now? Our consumer expert Nick Trend has delved into the FAQs on what Portugal’s move to the amber list (which comes into effect at 4am on Tuesday) means for holiday bookings and insurance.

Read his advice here.

Seven countries are to move from the amber to red list on Tuesday. No red list countries are to see restrictions downgraded, however. The UAE, including Dubai, is among the destinations still in this category.

UAE Ambassador to the UK, Mansoor Abulhoul, made this statement following the UK government’s latest announcement:

It is disappointing to see that the UAE has remained on the UK’s red travel list. We have best-in-class health and safety infrastructure to protect visitors and residents. This includes rapid testing, social distancing and sanitisation procedures at our airports, as well as Emirates and Etihad airlines fully sanitising all planes. Additionally, the UAE is among the top countries in the world for both vaccination rate and its testing programme.

We have strict controls to guard against troubling variants and have bespoke travel arrangements with several countries for vaccinated passengers, including Greece and Italy, and we look forward to negotiating similar solutions with other countries. Our aim is to allow families and friends separated by COVID-19 to reunite as soon as possible and to resume our crucial business and leisure travel links.

The chairman of Aito, the specialist travel association, had strong words on the Government’s approach to travel rules last night.

Chris Rowles said:

Changing Portugal from green to amber at short notice – despite telling us that more notice would be given – is not going to encourage consumer confidence, and it will bring the tiny number of bookings that have been coming in daily to a juddering halt. It will also create even more confusion and a demand for refunds, which customers will not be entitled to should they decline to travel.

We know the vaccine is working – even against the Delta variant (previously called the Indian variant), which the Government so cavalierly allowed to enter the UK by permitting flights from India to continue freely despite the obvious risks involved.

Now we have to listen to Matt Hancock stating today from the G7 Health Summit, as if butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth, that:‘We have got to make sure we keep this country safe…’. Words fail us.

He called for the Government to deliver the “long-overdue sector-specific support”, which it has “squirmed out of delivering to date”.

Portugal’s Cabinet of Minister of State for Foreign Affairs has reacted to the UK’s decision to strike Portugal from its green list. Its official Twitter account posted: 

We take note of the British decision to remove Portugal from the “green list” of travel, a decision whose logic cannot be reached. Portugal continues to carry out its prudent and gradual deconfinement plan, with clear rules for the safety of those who live here or visit us.

Robert Jenrick, the communities secretary, has been speaking about the Government’s decisions on travel traffic lights this morning.

Of Portugal’s removal from the red list, Mr Jenrick said although he appreciated the situation was “frustrating”, travellers had always been warned a country’s classification could change.

He told Sky News:

I completely understand how frustrating this is both for people in Portugal, and for millions of people here who would love to go on holiday abroad this summer. We were also clear that if you choose to go on holiday to countries on the green list, those countries are being reviewed every three weeks, and so there was always a risk with a fast-moving situation with new variants that countries might either go on to that list, or indeed come off.

That’s what’s happened here and I hope that people will understand – hard though this is – that we do need to take a cautious approach because people have made such progress in recent weeks and months.

Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove had to abandon a meeting with Boris Johnson and leaders of the devolved nations on Thursday after he was notified he may have come into contact with someone who had coronavirus on a trip to Portugal.

The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster had gone to Porto with his son to watch the Champions League final between Chelsea and Manchester City. Mr Gove has been alerted through the NHS app that he may have been in contact with someone who had the virus.

The Daily Mail reported that it is believed the contact happened on the flight home from Porto. The Cabinet Office confirmed Mr Gove had been pinged by the app.

Mr Gove had been due to meet the first ministers of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland with the Prime Minister in a bid to strengthen the union. Instead of self-isolating for 10 days, Mr Gove will be able to take part in a pilot scheme for workplaces, including No 10, where he can instead be tested every day for a week.

Jet2 has delayed the restart of flights and holidays until July following the Government’s decision to strike Portugal from the green list.

Steve Heapy, chief executive of Jet2.com and Jet2holidays said:

We know how disappointed our customers and independent travel agency partners will be following today’s announcement, and we share their concerns and frustrations.

The UK Government has repeatedly stated that it is making decisions based on infection and vaccination rates, yet many destinations continue to be left off the Green List despite having low infection rates and high vaccination rates. When you apply the Government’s own criteria for making decisions about travel, we simply cannot understand why more destinations across Europe, the Mediterranean and the Canary Islands are not allowed to open to UK holidaymakers.

We are now calling for complete openness and transparency when it comes to the data, so that customers and the industry can really understand what is driving these decisions. We agree that public health must be the number one priority. However, despite all the evidence and data showing that travel can restart safely and at scale, the UK continues to remain largely grounded whilst the rest of Europe opens up.

The travel company will resume flights and holidays on July (excluding its Jersey programme which will restart on June 24). In addition to that, because Turkey currently remains on the red list it has taken the decision to restart flights and holidays to Turkey on July 22. For any destinations currently on the amber list, it is allowing customers to amend bookings free of charge if they are due to travel between July 1 and July 21.

Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick said there were two reasons why Portugal was being moved from the green list of travel restrictions.

He told Sky News: “Firstly, the amount of positivity has increased significantly, it’s doubled in the last three weeks to a level that’s much higher than we have here in the UK.

“Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, although both countries have prevalence of the Indian variant or Delta variant as it’s called, we’re also seeing in Portugal now growing evidence of a further mutation being called the Nepal variant.

“We don’t yet know how much of a problem that is, how transmissibility is, whether it might be too difficult even for our vaccines. But it’s important that we take a cautious approach, and so we take action now whilst we do research and learn more about that variant.”

The main headlines from Thursday: 

• Portugal to move to amber list from Tuesday
• Red list for seven more countries, bringing total to 50
• Britons begin rush home from Portugal
• ‘Summer is being squeezed by a policy of fear’
• EU delays adding UK to ‘white list’

​Now onto today’s news.