Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what criteria the Global Taskforce plans to use to make its decision on the plans to open up international travel during the covid-19 pandemic.

As announced by the Prime Minister on 22 February, The Global Travel Taskforce is an important step in exploring how we can safely reopen international travel. It will develop a framework that can facilitate greater travel when the time is right, while managing the risk from imported cases and variants.

It will look to take a risk-based approach, making use of the suite of measures the Government already has in place such as testing (pre-departure testing and Test to Release) and self-isolation, as well as the recommendations from the first Global Travel Taskforce last year.

The Government will engage with stakeholders across the international travel sector to develop this work, in a similar way to the first Global Travel Taskforce last November, and will work at pace to report to the Prime Minister by 12 April. Further detail on the Taskforce and its plans will be shared shortly.