Does anybody here still think they are getting out of the country on 2021 ?

[Clive]

I hate to be that guy but I would prefer we focus on getting the UK as a whole on a stable footing, with society opening back up and some sense of normality being established. We need to take an advantage of being an Island with variants kicking about, even though i’m happy to see the UK vaccine rollout going extremely well (probably the only praise i can afford our uk and devolved governments). If we need to sacrifice foreign travel for most of this year as a price then i’m willing to accept that but ofcourse hope that government help for the travel industry is forthcoming and as a customer with money still in these businesses i’m happy to re-arrange into 2022.

For me I’m only interested in Scotland and how we navigate through this. Currently I think it’s absurd that international arrivals have more restrictions than domestic flights given that England is awash with the virus. Can’t see any justification for this at all. Nor can we call English visitors taking summer holidays in Scotland or vice versa a staycation. It’s meant to be about containing and curtailing the circulation of the virus.

But once the vaccine passport is sorted there will ge no reason those with the papers can’t go to England, Wales, Playa Malagueña or wherever they fancy.

[1-11]

UK needs to ‘get used to idea of re-vaccinating’ later this year amid new British Covid-19 variants, says Johnson
The UK will need to re-vaccinate people against Covid-19 later this year because of new variants of the virus that are potentially more resistant to jabs, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has warned.

This is a never ending story of new mutations, failing vaccines and continued social restrictions.
Say for talks sake, it takes until 2023 for restrictions to be lifted.
We can already write off 2021- you are not going anywhere this year, and I would suggest that 2022 is iffy too – so I cannot imagine the government having any further valid reasons for keeping us in Lockdown any longer than that. Sure, they will spin the mutations story for as many times as they can, but eventually people’s need for some joy in their life will overcome any fear of dying which has been instilled in them.

What is the economy going to look like in 2023. After years of high unemployment and shutdowns, who is still going to have any money left to go on holiday ?
How much more borrowing can the UK government undertake until it trashes the last smidgen of worth in its currency ?
If the UK economy crashes then public sector pensions will be wiped out along with it.
We cannot afford to lose sight of the fact that all public spending is ultimately funded by economic output of which there has been very little of late.

[Clive]

Currently I think it’s absurd that international arrivals have more restrictions than domestic flights given that England is awash with the virus. Can’t see any justification for this at all. Nor can we call English visitors taking summer holidays in Scotland or vice versa a staycation. It’s meant to be about containing and curtailing the circulation of the virus.

You're saying that as if there are no restrictions on travelling to and from England: across the UK, it's illegal to leave your house, except for an essential reason. On UK and international summer holidays, for me, it's not as simple as just (effectively) banning everyone from going anywhere as there's more to real life than just COVID. It's about balancing the risks. Obviously, right now, while the vaccination programme is ongoing, the uncertainty about mutant strains and the high number of cases, the risks from COVID are high. But, come the summer, if cases are low and if a large number of people in the UK have been vaccinated then risks of being completely shutdown outweighs the risk of death from COVID. The risk of dying from COVID will be low in that case and there would be no reason not to allow domestic travel across the UK. If the shutdown continues in that scenario, Scotland will lose some of it's hard earned connectivity to the outside world. Airlines and other related business will move their assets elsewhere, outside Scotland, especially if restrictions are loosened around the rest of the UK and Europe. As a result, even more jobs will be lost, even more livelihoods will be lost and the already deep mental health crisis in the country will deepen. There has to be a balance between the risks of death from COVID and the risk of destroying livelihoods, which inevitably also has an impact on health.

In terms of international travel and hotel quarantine in Scotland, in my opinion, Scottish Government needs to come up with an exit strategy as soon as possible on how we're going to transition away from a blanket hotel quarantine policy. There has to be some kind of criteria set out so the industry make effective plans when the data allows. There has to be something - if X % of a population have had the vaccine, there are Y cases in general, Z cases of mutant strains, combined with a testing strategy, for example. I know that's too simplistic and I'm not saying that it's easy to get the balance of risk right, but the industry has to know that it will end or, as I said already, they'll up sticks and go elsewhere.

All in my humble opinion, of course.

What we can’t do is what we did last summer - eradicate the virus in Scotland and allow travellers to re-seed it.

Whether those travellers are from Telford or Timbuktu should not make any difference. They can’t travel except in exceptional circumstances and if they do they have to go along with the quarantine measures.

The vaccine passport sounds like a decent exit strategy to me. Once the right amount of people have been vaccinated at both ends then there’s no reason we can’t travel or receive those inbound tourists.

[Bearsden]

Simple answer . . . No

We can't even agree within the four nations of the UK so what chance with any other countries

I cannot see the prevalence of the virus + variants getting down to 'acceptable' levels for months and of course there will be countries ahead of the curve and others behind the curve - the bulk of UK outbound tourism is to the EU and there hangs another obstacle

[1-11]

.
.
If we ever want things to go back to “Normal”, then we all need to start acting normally again.

Consider this:
What would happen if :
- We all stop wearing masks and we all stop anti-social distancing.
- If you want to protect yourself by taking a vaccine, then take a vaccine. Let those who do not want a vaccine be free not to take one. It’s an adult choice.
- If you are scared to go out, then just stay at home. Do your shopping on-line.
- Open up all businesses.
- Open up all travel by road, by rail and by air.

What we need to keep in mind is that this pathogen is deadly primarily only to the very weak and to the very old.
All others have got a 99.5% recovery rate. So if you do catch Covid, your chances of recovery are very high.
In fact, people with a high level of Vitamin D in their body are known to have a relatively less serious bout of illness.
Also to be considered is that medications are available to treat the illness should you get it.

Now if somebody is to say, “We need to prevent the NHS from being overwhelmed”, then I must ask “Why ?”
Let the NHS get overwhelmed, after all it’s only the covid wards; the cancer wards and the coronary wards and all the outpatient wards have been idled. It must be painfully obvious that people will die as a result of lockdowns. Just think suicide, depression, untreated and un-diagnosed cancers etc.
Where is the balance ?
We are all suffering from Covid hysteria to the exclusion of all rational thought.
Besides, the government have also had plenty of time to build some new hospitals. That is what the Chinese did. They built new hospitals dedicated to Covid patients. Why has the UK govt. not done this ?
The cost of a dozen new hospitals to cater for a flood of Covid patients is just chickenfeed compared to the money that the economy is losing through ongoing lockdowns.

If you want a return to “Normality”, then people need to accept the risk that goes along with that. Let’s face it, we are never going to eradicate Death, and to ask our young and healthy people to give up their education and training and the best years of their lives, in some futile attempt to do so, should be unacceptable to us all.
Mankind has been living with the 'Flu for millenia, and although Covid-19 is said to be about 3.5 times more deadly, it is just something more that we are going to have to deal with.
I for one, cannot put my life on hold for any longer.

[dav3]

.
.
If we ever want things to go back to “Normal”, then we all need to start acting normally again.

Consider this:
What would happen if :
- We all stop wearing masks and we all stop anti-social distancing.
- If you want to protect yourself by taking a vaccine, then take a vaccine. Let those who do not want a vaccine be free not to take one. It’s an adult choice.
- If you are scared to go out, then just stay at home. Do your shopping on-line.
- Open up all businesses.
- Open up all travel by road, by rail and by air.

What we need to keep in mind is that this pathogen is deadly primarily only to the very weak and to the very old.
All others have got a 99.5% recovery rate. So if you do catch Covid, your chances of recovery are very high.
In fact, people with a high level of Vitamin D in their body are known to have a relatively less serious bout of illness.
Also to be considered is that medications are available to treat the illness should you get it.

Now if somebody is to say, “We need to prevent the NHS from being overwhelmed”, then I must ask “Why ?”
Let the NHS get overwhelmed, after all it’s only the covid wards; the cancer wards and the coronary wards and all the outpatient wards have been idled. It must be painfully obvious that people will die as a result of lockdowns. Just think suicide, depression, untreated and un-diagnosed cancers etc.
Where is the balance ?
We are all suffering from Covid hysteria to the exclusion of all rational thought.
Besides, the government have also had plenty of time to build some new hospitals. That is what the Chinese did. They built new hospitals dedicated to Covid patients. Why has the UK govt. not done this ?
The cost of a dozen new hospitals to cater for a flood of Covid patients is just chickenfeed compared to the money that the economy is losing through ongoing lockdowns.

If you want a return to “Normality”, then people need to accept the risk that goes along with that. Let’s face it, we are never going to eradicate Death, and to ask our young and healthy people to give up their education and training and the best years of their lives, in some futile attempt to do so, should be unacceptable to us all.
Mankind has been living with the 'Flu for millenia, and although Covid-19 is said to be about 3.5 times more deadly, it is just something more that we are going to have to deal with.
I for one, cannot put my life on hold for any longer.

[dav3]

i asked you once before if you had lost anyone to covid.you never replied .you might change your way of thinking if it happened to one of yours.but hey-ho let the elderly and frail die after all what have they ever done for us.......if cases do fall in the spring due to vaccine try telling people that they cant go on holiday or visit relatives.would be a big vote loser.would make sense though to ban foreign holidays until late summer when most of us and a lot of the rest of europe has been vaccinated.

[Clive]

i asked you once before if you had lost anyone to covid.you never replied .you might change your way of thinking if it happened to one of yours.but hey-ho let the elderly and frail die after all what have they ever done for us.......if cases do fall in the spring due to vaccine try telling people that they cant go on holiday or visit relatives.would be a big vote loser.would make sense though to ban foreign holidays until late summer when most of us and a lot of the rest of europe has been vaccinated.

Got to agree.

Sadly and very unfortunately travel is incompatible with virus control while it’s a pandemic. This is an extremely harsh reality which those in the industry can’t get away from. Most will accept this.

The sooner the virus is eradicated, the sooner all of us who have survived can start getting back to normal, including travelling.

I’ll be travelling out of Scotland as soon as I’m allowed to both arrive in another country, enjoy the break and arrive back home. But not a moment sooner.

[Paris]

No ‘exact date’ for when Britons can legally go on holiday again, says UK transport secretary
The British transport secretary has said he doesn't know when restrictions on international travel will be lifted, adding that legally being able to go on holiday will depend on progress with Covid-19 vaccinations here and abroad.

Think of all the money you will save on sun-screen, and not having to drink cheap wine.

I’ve been out of the country (last week of January) I was in Birmingham on business, although why was I allowed to???? Beats me ..!!!
Was booked to MAD for Easter, now refunded by EZY and I’ve rebooked for a cottage in Banff. I remain booked to travel GLA-DXB may 8th - 16th. GLA-ALC may 18th - 21st. GLA-BER early July & Accommodation booked in Adeje Tenerife (but no flight yet) for October school week. I expect ALC flight to cancel, the rest I remain upbeat they’ll run and if not? I’ll cancel or move them forward. Got used to now doing this, but my glass defo 1/2 full, 20% of Scotland now vaccinated and hundreds of thousands have had the virus + vaccine program is running well... What happens on the rest of this island means nothing to me, what happens globally does... Leaving this country on holiday in 2021 depends on where we go (IMO) ... If I can travel to england... Why not elsewhere, their Covid numbers are high, but reducing and their vaccine count is good, so are many other countries and improving all the time. Roll on summer, my glass filling up daily.

[bill]

Personally I think that foreign travel may well be allowed but not until late Autumn at the earliest, so for that summer sun we'll be in the lap of the gods with a good ol' Scottish summer and battling with millions of midges.