Recommendation 24

We asked about the experience of guests in quarantine hotels and what had been done to safeguard people staying in the MQS. DHSC told us that it had put a great deal of effort into making sure that hotels were a safe environment for all those staying in them. It said that it had security guards in place, and they all needed to have Security Industry Association licensing. It also explained that it had put in place measures to ensure that there were liaison officers in every hotel and that there was a rolling 24-hour report on all incidents in hotels. When asked about the reporting helpline and why this had only been established after allegations began to be made about security guards, the Department confirmed that this had been introduced as an additional safeguard. DHSC told us that five security guards had been dismissed for gross misconduct, but that this was out of thousands of security guards overall and that fewer than 1.5% of people using MQS had complained.43 40 Qq 89–90; C&AG’s Report, para 16 41 Qq 90–91 42 Qq 89, 95; C&AG’s Report, Figure 12 43 Qq 98–100 18 Managing cross-border travel during the COVID-19 pandemic 3 The impact of the cross-border travel measures Evaluating the impact of the cross-border travel measures