Johnson Attacked for Lifting U.K. Virus Border Controls in March

Written by
Robert Hutton
Written by

Robert Hutton

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(Bloomberg) -- Boris Johnson's government made an “inexplicable” decision to lift border restrictions as coronavirus was spreading out of control in the U.K., a cross-party panel of lawmakers said in a scathing report.

The House of Commons Home Affairs Committee said Wednesday that the March 13 decision to remove all restrictions on the movements of people arriving in the U.K. came as other countries were tightening border controls. As many as 10,000 cases of coronavirus may have been imported into the country around this time, the committee said.

It also criticized the way ministers talked up the opportunity for people to take summer vacations abroad as they lifted travel restrictions, only to reimpose them on some countries without warning last month. The panel said the U.K.'s Joint Biosecurity Centre should publish information about the different levels of risk in each country, to help people assess the chances of getting caught out if they book holidays.

The U.K. has had the highest level of deaths related to Covid-19 in Europe, and Johnson has promised a public inquiry into his government's handling of the pandemic. The Home Affairs Committee's report is a taster of how difficult that process will be.

The committee said that from March 13 to June 8 there were no quarantine or isolation requirements for any travelers without symptoms, and no testing or screening at the border. This meant the virus “spread faster and reached more people,” said committee chairwoman Yvette Cooper, a member of the opposition Labour Party.

“The U.K. was almost unique in having no border checks or quarantine arrangements at that time,” Cooper said in a statement. “That alone should have rung loud alarm bells for ministers and made them think again. Many times ministers told us they were following the science, but we cannot find any science at all behind their completely inexplicable decision.”

Meanwhile Parliament's Health Committee, led by Johnson's former leadership rival Jeremy Hunt, has announced it will begin commissioning an independent grading of the government's record on delivering pledges, rating them from “outstanding” to “inadequate.”