Select committee: Transport Committee
Recommendation 2
Fifth Report: The impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the aviation sector: Interim report
Published 11 Mar 2021
Paragraph 8
Addressed to Department for Transport
Transport Committee The impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the aviation sector: follow-up All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
The aviation industry thrives on certainty. In order to return passenger aircraft to the skies and to connect the UK to the world, a road map to restart international travel is urgently needed. The Department has not yet specified the standards that destination countries must meet on vaccine and testing capabilities in order to reopen for travel with the UK. In addition, it has not clarified whether such criteria will be flexible if the risk of transmission of new variants between vaccinated individuals is found to be minimal.
From: Transport Committee, Fifth Report: The impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the aviation sector: Interim report (HC 1257), paragraph 8, 11 March 2021
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 13 May 2021 (deadline 11 May 2021).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government notes the Committee's recommendations on restarting international travel and the recovery plan, partially agrees with two, and points to the Global Travel Taskforce report and a 'traffic light' system as its response.
- On the Committee's call to maintain the 17 May restart, the government "notes this recommendation". It says measures limiting outbound travel "will be removed by 17 May at the earliest", with a "traffic light" country system.
- On the road map and destination standards, it "partially agrees". It says wider vaccine and testing standards "must be agreed internationally", and sets three review checkpoints, the first "no later than 28 June 2021".
- On quarantine, it says all measures "will be reviewed, as appropriate" at the three checkpoints, rather than giving a phase-out timetable.
- On the recovery plan, the government "notes" the recommendation, says a strategic framework will be published "later this year", and is "willing to provide an update" to the Committee in early autumn.