Beta France Reunion Raab

[Lico]

Lots of dancing and face saving diplomacy going on in the background (I think)

www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/29/ministers-under-fire-putting-france-england-amber-plus-list

Best of all is that you can fly direct from Reunion into London without having to quarantine because Reunion is on Amber list!!

Best of all is that you can fly direct from Reunion into London without having to quarantine because Reunion is on Amber list!!

No you can't. There are no direct flights from Réunion to London. They all go via Paris or Marseille.

You can however get to London from Reunion via only amber list counties such as Mauritius and thereby avoid quarantine.

But the overall point is that the senior ministers can't justify (or agree with each other) as to why France is on the Amber plus list, causing large numbers of British travellers to needlessly quarantine and spend significantly on tests.

The sooner the government sort this mess out the better, each time a new statement is made it makes the original decision look more incorrect. I wonder if there is something else Brexit related going on behind the scenes, almost hope so because otherwise it just looks wrong.

There may be a link between the continued constraints on travellers from France and the vague idea in BJ's mind that Macron is behind the EU's refusal to renegotiate the NI protocol that BJ himself told voters was fab not so long ago...

Add to that an inability to process basic geography and analyse data...

France being 'amber plus' is economic sanctions dressed up as Covid restrictions, pure and simple. Call them economic sanctions to tell what seems the truth.

Emmanuel Macron is way ahead of any other person who can be elected French President next April. The UK government should just grow up. Napoleon has been dead for over 200 years.

Quite.
And in the meantime, my dad might die before I can travel back to the UK and see him, thanks to this willy waving.

Auld: so sorry to hear about your Dad.

Daily Hate reported that Johnson might put France, Italy and Spain on red list!! Seems that Johnson & co want to prevent Uk tourists from holidaying in Europe.

I wonder whether Macron will want to get rid of Le Touquet agreement as part of his manifesto ...i.e move back the British Border to the UK 😄😄 this should worry Priti Patel !!

Meanwhile this jingoism is affecting many lives ..

Thanks, Lico.

I've felt like a pawn in the Brexiteers' game for years now and this is just more of the same shit, TBH.

Neither Raab nor Shapps were consulted about the restrictions on travellers from France: Javid and BJ decided together and then sent Raab out to defend them.

If they put France, Italy and Spain on the red list it would be a political decision, surely? The data can't possibly support it?

God knows what they will do. They can always find some data to support their argument... September will be interesting...

@AuldAlliance decisions on Covid policies are in reality only made by four ministers I understand- the Chancellor, Prime Minister, Health Secretary and Mr Gove (Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster).

@Lico the ending of the Le Touquet agreement could be part of Monsieur Macron's re-election bid, especially if Xavier Bertrand is close behind in the polls.

I don’t know much about French politics.
Isn’t Marine Le Pen MP for Calais or thereabout?
Last time we drove over, when in Calais, we were shocked at how the French government let the British impose so much barbed wire on French soil. Surely Calais people must be really fed up with all this ...I wonder whether the British Border in Calais is contributing to Calais’s ordeal .. (I have no idea).

@AnotherEmma

If they put France, Italy and Spain on the red list it would be a political decision, surely? The data can't possibly support it?

Political suicide more like.

In the middle of the school holidays.

@newnortherner111
I was chatting about this with a friend yesterday who's a civil servant with access to a lot of information. He told me that Shapps and Raab were totally sidelined on this and were furious, whereas they are usually at least consulted in some token way...

The decision is clearly political: you can fly from Réunion to the UK via a range of places, notably but not only Mauritius (though that may now be impossible given the new restrictions in Réunion), so the beta variant excuse is obviously crap.

If they do put France on the red list in the coming days or weeks, there will be fury in the UK, as people have now (re)planned trips based on the amber plus rules invented solely for French travel. If they did that, there might be a huge U-turn a week later when BJ twigged he'd pissed off a lot of his voter base with holiday homes in France...

Likewise the guff they were spouting about AZ possibly not standing up to Beta. Real world data from Canada shows otherwise www.astrazeneca.com/media-centre/press-releases/2021/vaxzevria-is-highly-effective-after-one-dose-against-severe-disease-or-hospitalisation-caused-by-beta-and-delta-variants-of-concern.html

I’m utterly fucking sick of this vile government. The cronyism. The lack of transparency. Germany for example have a regular travel announcement. Residents know when it is. They know what time it is. The criteria for the decision making process is clear, so people can keep an eye on things. Here fuck knows. It’s utterly political. It can change overnight on a whim.

I’d not seen my double vaccinated parents who live abroad in an EU country for 18 months. They have 6 grandchildren and 3 children living in the U.K. They both had both doses of exactly the same vaccine as me and their other adult children (Pfizer). We could have travelled to the country they live in and not needed to quarantine on our return to the U.K. because we are double vaccinated. Yet when they finally cracked (after not seeing any of us so long) they had to quarantine (despite case numbers in their country of residence being lower than here). Thankfully that has been dropped, unless of course you are coming from France. I pity the poor families who’ve been separated for so long with no end in sight both in France, and elsewhere.

Neither I nor my kids have seen my parents in over 2 years.

I doubt the kids will see them until some time in 2022.
Not sure I'll get there before then, either.

France no longer amber-plus! From Sunday
www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58079107

I know!
But does it apply only to UK residents returning to the UK from France, or also to those living in France wanting to travel to the UK??
www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/04/fully-vaccinated-britons-returning-from-france-and-spain-will-not-need-to-quarantine

The BBC article is badly worded, implying it's British citizens only. Indy is better - it's all travellers.
www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/travel-restrictions-red-amber-green-list-france-b1897047.html

Official link
www.gov.uk/guidance/red-amber-and-green-list-rules-for-entering-england

From the gov.uk link I just shared:

France update from Sunday 8 August
If you arrive in England from 4am Sunday 8 August, and you are fully vaccinated in the UK, USA or Europe, you will not need to:
quarantine on arrival in England
take a day 8 Covid-19 test
You must still book and take a day 2 Covid-19 test.

Thanks.
The Guardian article referred to "Britons" as well, hence my question...

Such good news!

As long as Scotland follows suit, that is.