Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to his oral statement of 7 Septemeber, Official Report, column 365, on International Travel, if he will make it his policy to implement a covid-19 testing regime, with airports being required to procure the necessary testing and laboratory capacity, in order to reduce quarantine length.

The Government is actively working on the practicalities of using testing to release people from self-isolation earlier than 14 days. Officials across the Government are working with health experts with the aim of cutting the self-isolation period without adding to infection risk or infringing on our overall NHS test capacity. The Secretary of State for Transport has committed to updating the House on testing of international arrivals in the coming weeks.

Public Health England prepared a paper on the effectiveness of ‘double testing’ travellers coming to the UK. The paper is available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/phe-investigation-into-the-effectiveness-of-double-testing-travellers-incoming-to-the-uk-for-signs-of-covid-19-17-june-2020