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If the Government is planning to stop us travelling this summer, it's about time it said so

A UK beach holiday might be our only option this summer - getty
A UK beach holiday might be our only option this summer - getty

It’s worth starting this article by saying that it is very much a fool’s errand to second-guess the Government at the moment - so I must be a fool for even attempting such a feat.

But then, you’ll need to forgive me this shortcoming, because it’s difficult to get a precise handle on the situation in these most twisting and torturous of times. The whole “we’re testing, we’re not testing, we’re testing” thing. The hailing of the “apparent success” of the fight against Covid-19 in a country which has the highest death toll in Europe. The mixed messaging - which, at the moment, seems to be [squints hard at the wording] “stay viral, control the media narrative, drive across the country without stopping for petrol”. Or something like that. I’m not sure. Clearly my eyesight is playing up. I’d better throw my child into the car and head down the road for 30 or so miles to gauge just how badly.

So yes, I’m clearly a fool on an errand. And anything that follows must, by default, be foolish. But bear with me while I take another look at the state of play in the UK travel and aviation industries - or what’s left of them after more than two months of inactivity - and wonder if, when it comes to the summer, the Government would rather we just didn’t.

Travel, that is. Anywhere. Or, at least, anywhere beyond Dover. Dover is probably fine. Eastbourne too. No doubt Brighton is good; Blackpool too. And somewhere like Whitby or Whitehaven or Lowestoft or Aberystwyth or St Andrews - yeah, sure, knock yourself out. But Spain, or Greece, or Portugal, or France? Well, hmmm, yeah [brief checking of notes and the feigning of being diverted by a question from the next room], not so much.

If you were cynical - as well, of course, as foolish - you might be beginning to think that the grand plan for tourism over the next three months is not to encourage the industry back towards the position it was in before the Covid-crisis happened (or as close to it as you can get after such a big shock to the system), but quite the opposite. In effect, to ensure that nobody is in a position to go anywhere - beyond their nearest seaside town.

A couple soak up the sun in Filey - getty
A couple soak up the sun in Filey - getty

After all, why would you let British holidaymakers slip away to Corfu, or Mallorca, or the Algarve, or the Dordogne, when they can be all but pinned to home soil and made to inject their travel budgets - and three months’ worth of pent-up locked down instinct to dine on sunny terraces, sip cocktails, slurp at ice creams, stay in nice hotels and buy trinkets in small shops - into the British economy? Why let France, Portugal or Spain absorb all that lovely expendable income when it could be propping up the UK instead?

If, as I said, you were being foolishly cynical, or cynically foolish, you might just draw this unspoken conclusion from the current “strategies” for restarting travel. The potential “air bridges” with selected other countries touted by the Transport Minister one day, only for Home Office sources to brand the scheme “unworkable” the next. The imposition - three months into a pandemic - of a two-week period of quarantine for new arrivals in the UK that will have negligible health benefits, but will certainly make people think hard about jetting off for a few days knowing that they will have to self-isolate for fortnight when they get home. That’s assuming they can reach their destination - because France’s inevitable, understandable reaction to the UK’s quarantine announcement has been to institute an identical policy of its own. Not that even a short-haul journey to France is feasible at present. Not while the Foreign and Commonwealth Office is continuing with its time-limitless advice against non-essential travel anywhere outside Britain - a stance which, while it does not categorically ban you from leaving these shores, means no tour operator can sell you a package to do so, and no insurer can or will cover you for the risk.

France might be a leap too far - getty
France might be a leap too far - getty

We have reached a point now, at the tail end of May, when planning a summer getaway is becoming less and less practical by the day. While January, and its post-Christmas gloom, is the busiest time in the UK for booking a break, plenty of trips are arranged and paid for in February, March and April - months which, this year, have been compromised by the pandemic. A loosening of the travel restrictions on Britons would surely see a mass rush to the holiday company website - but the window of opportunity is closing as continental Europe starts to reopen and its own constrained citizens consider that leap for the beach. By the time Britain is similarly untethered, it may be too late to buy any overseas venture.

Now, you may not want to listen to the musings of a cynical, foolish journalist on this matter. But if that’s the case, will an industry professional do? Noel Josephides, the chairman of the Association of Independent Tour Operators (AITO), said something on near-identical lines a few days ago. “I feel the Government does not really want to encourage overseas travel as it mistakenly seeks to boost domestic holiday-making,” he commented. “This is becoming increasingly clear. Instead of cooperating with EU members, the UK is standing apart. What a shame. Why the mixed messages [and] random comments by inexperienced ministers which raise hopes and then dash them?”

He added that the Government was currently showing “no interest” in holidaymakers looking to travel abroad later this summer - and estimated that this would amount to a drop of some £70billion in national GDP “because so much is spent prior [to a break]”.

Naturally, you might think that the Government’s plan - if that is the plan, and if we can describe it with a word as certain as “plan” - is a perfectly sensible one. The UK has just lost what is approaching an entire quarter to enforced inaction. What is wrong with diverting much of the money that would be spent anyway this summer back into the domestic economy - thus helping to revive hotels, bars, restaurants and small businesses that have seen their income shrink to almost zero since the middle of March? Europe and the rest of the world will be there next year - but for now, forget converting your money into euros and enjoy the sights on your doorstep. It is not as if Britain is not blessed with places of extraordinary beauty, and if we’re in luck, the weather may play its part as well.

An ideal scenario? Perhaps not. But reasonable in the circumstances? Well, possibly.

But if this is the Government’s wider intention then it needs to say so, rather than making statements which have to be poo-poohed in a matter of hours, while dithering distractedly the rest of the time. If, effectively, we are locked down within our own borders for the rest of the summer, then this needs to be explained. Tour operators and airlines need to be advised of this so that they can plan accordingly (presumably by lighting a candle to their chosen deity and praying) - while hotel owners and restaurateurs in this country could do with some warning as when they might be expected to cater to a population in serious need of a break from what has become the norm. Then there are the would-be tourists who managed to organise a holiday in the distant pre-pandemic mists of January, and are clinging to the vague hope that their purchases may go ahead. Don’t they deserve clarity?

Don’t we all? Because as it stands, and not for the first time, we’re being played for fools.