Quarantine will ‘kill travel industry’, government warned amid Tory backlash

Former ministers call for rethink of 14-day self-isolation plan for arrivals

The government is facing a backlash from a group of Tory MPs over its quarantine plans as trade leaders warned it would “kill” the travel industry.

Several former ministers including Chris Grayling are backing calls for a rethink of the 14-day isolation period for people entering the UK, according to The Daily Telegraph.

Home secretary, Priti Patel, announced the quarantine scheme last month and it is due to come into force on 8 June.

However, travel and aviation leaders have criticised the plans and demanded that they should be scrapped.

“All the evidence we have is that this will just kill travel,” Simon Mcnamara, of the International Air Transport Association, told The Times.

“Governments seem to me to have a stark choice. They cannot pretend that quarantine enables their international travel markets to open up.

“If they persist with quarantine it is effectively the same as locking down your country.”

It comes after Heathrow airport’s chief executive, John Holland-Kaye, warned earlier this month that “closing our borders to all will be closing Britain to business.”

Travel and tourism bosses also described the quarantine plan as “poorly thought-out, wholly detrimental to industry recovery and more or less unworkable”.

The Independent revealed on Saturday that at least 2 million people — including bus drivers and dentists — will qualify for exemption because of their jobs.