Covid Security at UK Borders

Gareth Johnson Excerpts

Monday 1st February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con) [V]]

I am pleased to be able to make this speech, because the Opposition motion would have us treat people from countries where there is virtually no covid in the same way as those from countries with very high levels. It makes little sense to me to place people from New Zealand in hotels. Any threat created by their travel, for example, can be dealt with by a period of self-isolation. I applaud the Government’s logical and proportionate approach. Of course, as with all things associated with covid, we need to keep every measure under continuous review, but right now the logical approach is to ban flights from areas of very high covid levels and for hotels to be required where appropriate.

The Opposition motion also lacks logic. The literal wording of the motion has clearly not been thought through. It requires “all arrivals” in the UK to quarantine in a hotel. It actually states:

“That this House calls on the Government to immediately introduce a comprehensive hotel quarantine system for all arrivals into the UK”—

not some, but all arrivals. The shadow Minister said there would be exemptions for hauliers. That does not change what we will actually vote on. The motion provides for no exemptions, so this measure would have to include pilots, air cabin staff, and any engineer working in aviation or in the channel tunnel. The motion would entail all those people, when they arrived in the UK, going into a hotel for 10 days. It mentions no exemptions—not even for people bringing the Pfizer vaccine to the UK from Belgium.

Either the Labour party supports the literal wording of the motion and wants to stop every person coming to the UK whatever the circumstances, or it does not and the motion is just worded for political effect, highlighting the ridiculous nature of Opposition day debates now. It has to be one or the other. We are asked to take Opposition day debates seriously. Labour has tried to change what we are voting on, and only nine of its Back Benchers applied to speak in the debate. It clearly does not take its own debates very seriously.

We therefore cannot support this motion. The current measures are logical and proportionate. I believe it is right that we check why passengers are travelling to avoid unlawful and unnecessary trips. We have been criticised on one occasion for being too strict, and on another for being too lax. This virus is a moving beast and we need to be flexible too.

Anyone can play party politics with this virus, but what is needed is a constructive approach. It is positive that hotels are being used in this way, given that they are not being used very much at the moment. We must also bear in mind the impact on our aviation industry, so I welcome the measures that are being brought in there, but I do not welcome this motion.