Growing fears over Scots quarantine regime a week before launch

The Scottish Government is facing calls for urgent action to ensure a tough new quarantine regime is ready in time amid claims many operators are still in the dark.

International arrivals into the UK will be placed into mandatory quarantine in hotels for 10 days

Health Secretary Jeane Freeman would not say whether any hotel rooms have yet been booked for the new system which will see people entering Scotland forced to quarantine in approved hotels for 10 days.

Operators of the country's biggest airports also say that they don’t know how the plans, which come into force in a week, will work.

Ms Freeman would only say that "discussions are under way" with hotels and airports, while the Scottish Government was still seeking to persuade UK ministers to take a tougher stance on quarantining international arrivals.

But Labour said a more urgent approach is now needed, with the new system set to come into force on February 15.

“The Scottish Government’s refusal to work with airports to introduce passenger testing and the current quarantine policy – where few people who should be quarantining are even checked – has been one of biggest weaknesses of the Covid response and no doubt contributed to bringing cases into the country," Labour transport spokesman Colin Smyth said.

“To now only talk about managed quarantine when the number of people travelling internationally has plummeted, and not bother to consult airports or operators on how it will work, is a classic case of the SNP’s rhetoric being tougher than their action.

“Both the UK and Scottish Governments got it wrong on international travel but instead of trying to cover up their failures, we need them to start working together on how best to tighten the rules, introduce passenger testing at airports and begin plans for a long-term term recovery for aviation when we start to move out of the pandemic.”

Deputy First Minister John Swinney is to make a statement at Holyrood this week on the plan. But it has emerged that operators of Edinburgh, Glasgow and Aberdeen airports have not yet been told how the plans will work.

The Scottish Government was continuing to talk to UK ministers "about trying to get them to agree that we should all be much tougher", Ms Freeman told BBC Scotland’s Sunday Show.

When asked directly if the Scottish Government had booked hotel rooms for those needing to quarantine, Ms Freeman would only say that "that work is under way".

She added: "Those discussions will continue with hotels and with airports and so on, and my colleague (Transport Secretary) Michael Matheson will be taking that forward."

Asked again if any hotel rooms had been booked, she said again that "discussions are under way".

The Health Secretary added: "We will want to quarantine everyone who is coming in internationally.

"If they are coming to Scotland from whatever country they are coming in from, we will want them to go into quarantine for that set period."

Boris Johnson said on January 27 that quarantine would be mandatory for anyone entering the UK from 33 so-called 'red list' countries where mutant virus strains have been detected.

However, Ms Sturgeon said that Scotland's rules would apply to "anyone who arrives directly into Scotland" and that UK rules did "not go far enough."

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