Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 09 December 2020
I certainly would have no objection to that, but the really important thing is that the Government should update the regulations to reflect changes in circumstances, and we simply have not had that.
To take the example that I just gave, non-essential travel to Cumbria is banned, although people can have non-essential travel between the Borders and Aberdeenshire, even although the prevalence of Covid in Cumbria is lower than the prevalence in Aberdeenshire. Travel to Cumbria is banned for one reason alone: it is because the regulations ban any travel outwith Scotland to any other part of the United Kingdom. There is no public health argument for that approach. Frankly, in my view that is discrimination against Borders communities, who regularly use services and visit friends and family in the nearest town or city, which is often in the north of England.
That is not the only anomaly in the system. Let us be clear that no one disputes that limiting travel is an important way to manage spread of the virus, and no one is arguing against the need to avoid non-essential travel between low-prevalence and high-prevalence areas, but the Scottish Government’s regulations actually make it a criminal offence to travel between two low-prevalence areas just because one of those areas happens to be in England. That is the anomaly and concern that I am raising on behalf of constituents, although I have to say that it is not the only anomaly in the regulations. [Interruption.]