Can nursery require quarantine beyond govt rules?

[GrinchTastic]

Just that really - we are going to Ireland, which has never been subject to any quarantine restrictions as it is in a Common Travel Area with the UK, and isn’t part of any air bridges or anything like that. Nursery said yesterday they are asking parents to quarantine for 14 days when returning from “overseas”. I wonder if they haven’t realised that Ireland is in a different boat to Greece/Germany/Italy etc by virtue of the CTA.

We’re also sailing into Northern Ireland, but back from Dublin.

Just wondering what the position is, or if anyone can offer any advice.

Thanks!

Like I said, this rule wasn’t communicated clearly to parents, doesn’t seem to be being applied in any systematic manner and isn’t in line with either govt rules and guidance OR a sensible assessment of the risks involved.

I agree with you, @grinchtastic, and think the pasting you're getting here is bizarre.

Sadly nurseries are generally able to impose whatever policies they like - e.g. many nurseries have illness exclusion policies far more strict than those suggested by Public Health England. If you're a dual-working-parent family and both have professional jobs, it's a real pain to have your child excluded totally unnecessarily. We ended up withdrawing from nursery and employing a nanny instead for exactly that reason.

Then go elsewhere.

@GrinchTastic

Does your husband pay to attend work, Fairybio?

And I’m surprised that an entire part of the U.K. is excluded like that - would like to know the legalities of that decision (not to mention the risk assessment, which is bonkers)

Holiday destination isn't a protected characteristic so a private company can impose whatever quarantine restrictions it wants.

Thanks Stonecoldbitch - I‘m pretty robust

I feel like many posters are revealing themselves to be pretty incapable of assessing and balancing risk, as well as understanding the particular position Ireland and NI have within the CTA.

I also find the “it’s a private nursery, they can do what they like” to be pretty odd (esp since my nursery emphasised throughout that they were following Council guidelines re closure and reopening) but I know it’s a favourite refrain on MN.

Actually yes I do. I think anyone who is selfish enough to leave their country of residence should be forced to quarantine.

So a relative who travels from Wales or Scotland in to England to attend their dying parents bedside or again to attend their mum's funeral is selfish and should quarantine!

It was much easier to close nurseries/schools than it is to reopen fully. Places are very nervous and more so as they are seeing rates rise and local lockdowns.

My DH's employer has issued a blanket statement saying that no 'international' travel is allowed. He was meant to fly into the north to join us. Unlikely to happen now as people don't get that NI is part of the UK and is not international but domestic. He could fly to Glasgow but not Belfast. How is that any different?

I would just take “no international travel” as not including travel to NI. In fact that’s what I’ll prob do.

If you're so hell bent on arguing with your nursery then ask them the basis for their risk assessment.

If it's based on government advice you can go all high and mighty and get the rules amended in your favour.

If it's based on zero tolerance of any travel involving ports/airports then you have to accept this is a private decision that they have taken to try and mitigate the risks of needing to shut the nursery for a long period of time.

As for your ludicrous assertion that NI is the same as Wales you either have a fucked up awareness of geography (plenty of land crossings between England & Wales...none involving ferry as far as I know) or a fucked up sense of politics (England and Wales is a common denominator for most laws...NI and Scotland have a very distinct law system).

I would like to know on what/whose advice they are imposing this? What risk assessment have they done? And for which countries/modes of travel?

It doesn’t matter does it? They have decided that they will protect their children and staff regardless in government guidelines and should be applauded!

If other parents decided to ignore quarantine and they had to close the nursery and you all had to be quarantined for two weeks via track and trace ... every few weeks, you’d be up in arms wouldn’t you?

You’d expect others to quarantine, but not you and yours?

@grinchtastic I have a job that involves appraising, weighing up, and balancing risk on a daily basis. I am very good at it. A lot of the people who flap the most about this sort of thing are less able to appraise risk, in my experience.

Why bother asking if you are just going to ignore it anyway?

The nursery DD goes too, and DH's work, have a quarantine period for anyone travelling out of the UK. That includes Ireland as it's not the UK.

The nursery have also stated that if there are too many closures needed during the summer they'll have to consider quarantine periods after holidays within the UK. The only cases there have been locally have been people who've been elsewhere to higher risk places.

Perhaps it’s easy for you to throw around words like “selfish”. Do you live close to your family? Have you seen them in the last 8 months? Are you likely to be able to see them before the end of the year?

Don’t know about the poster who used the word “selfish” but I have only seen DH and DS in person as we live together. DD, FIL, DF, DB, SIL etc etc only seen on screens since before lockdown. (Over a year in the case of DB, SIL and DF). I MIGHT get to see DD in the next few weeks but certainly no one else.

Does it include NI though, lyra which is, after all, in the U.K.?

I am finding the thread very useful actually, as it’s helping me to process and articulate my objections to this as well as consider how I will approach the nursery about it.

@Aragog

Actually yes I do. I think anyone who is selfish enough to leave their country of residence should be forced to quarantine.

So a relative who travels from Wales or Scotland in to England to attend their dying parents bedside or again to attend their mum's funeral is selfish and should quarantine!

@Aragog yes they should quarantine because England is so full of plague right now. They’re not necessarily being selfish though. Those two facets aren’t always linked and your question was disingenuous.

@GrinchTastic

Does it include NI though, lyra which is, after all, in the U.K.?

I am finding the thread very useful actually, as it’s helping me to process and articulate my objections to this as well as consider how I will approach the nursery about it.

You've already said you're going to ROI though. If you're going to lie to the nursery regardless of the answers here why continue to post?

@GrinchTastic

Does it include NI though, lyra which is, after all, in the U.K.?

I am finding the thread very useful actually, as it’s helping me to process and articulate my objections to this as well as consider how I will approach the nursery about it.

You're not being asked to quarantine because you are going to NI. You're being asked to quaranting because you are also going to Ireland.

Someone who travelled from Scotland and spent a week in Dover then hopped on the ferry for a week (or even a day) in France would have to quarantine under their rules because France isn't in the UK.

You'll have to follow the rules because you are visiting a country outwith the UK when you go to Ireland. If you were only going to NI then you'd be staying in the UK.

But France isn’t in the CTA, which is what governs travel to/from the U.K. Ireland (and the Channel Isles, Isle of Man) is.

It’s really clear how many posters don’t understand what the CTA is.

It's not a case of not understanding the CTA. The nursery have decided they are having a quarantine period for anyone who leaves the UK regardless of agreements, airbridges, or whatever. They are able to do that.

You are leaving the UK therefore you'll have to have a quarantine period before you return your child to the nursery

In fact, have just realised their exact phrasing was “if you’re travelling overseas”, which is even more ambiguous. The Republic of Ireland isn’t overseas from NI.

What is your definition of overseas?

@GrinchTastic

In fact, have just realised their exact phrasing was “if you’re travelling overseas”, which is even more ambiguous. The Republic of Ireland isn’t overseas from NI.

It is overseas from where you live so even clearer now

Honestly, when parents wonder why nurseries, holiday clubs and other child-related places are slow to open this is why. Instead of reading the rules and understanding why they've been put in place so many parents decide to find every which way they can to show why they are exempt.

Like I said, no rules have been issued. They haven’t issued any policy or enquired where people are going on holidays.