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Tier 4 travel: Full legal wording now published, in force from 7am Sunday

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The Government has published the Statutory Instrument which pushed the Tier 4 regulations into UK law at 7am on Sunday.

The full legal text is here. As usual, you should ignore anything said by any Government representative yesterday and focus purely on what is written.

It is as I expected, because it is the same structure as used in November. There is no ban on travel per se for anyone living in Tier 4. There IS a ban on leaving your house, however, and so travelling the airport would be in breach of this unless it meets one of the exceptions.

Tier 4 travel: Full legal wording now published

As usual, you are allowed to travel abroad if you are planning to visit an estate agent or show home or view a residential property for sale or rent.

Unless you are planning to look at houses whilst away, you should have left your home in Tier 4 before 7am this morning.

Hotels in Tier 4 areas are allowed to remain open if they wish. Guests must be travelling for work or for one of the other reasons stated, such as moving house or to attend a medical appointment.

The regulations do not discuss travelling to/from Tier 4 areas to fly from Heathrow, Luton or London City (which are in Tier 4) but this is presumably covered in the earlier legislation to which this is an amendment. Gatwick is not in Tier 4.

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General

Comments (222)

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  • Anna says:
    20 Dec20 December 08:43

    Does this make all the Londoners who fled to the regions last night technically fugitives then?!

    • Rob says:
      20 Dec20 December 09:16

      No, because it was before 7am.

      • Anna says:
        20 Dec20 December 09:18

        But they are now away from their homes without a lawful reason (most of them anyway)?!

        • Anna says:
          20 Dec20 December 09:20

          It says people “may not be outside the place where they are living” – that suggests to me that it doesn’t matter when you actually left.

          • Tariq says:
            20 Dec20 December 09:29

            There’s a clause further down relating to people who were outside their residence before the regulations took effect.

            Is it any surprise that these relate to South East and East of England, the areas where the road networks needs to be cleared in order to deal with and prevent Brexit related supply chain disruption… 🙄

          • A says:
            20 Dec20 December 10:03

            Replying to Tariq but prevented due to nesting restrictions – the exception from the restriction on being outside the place you are living, which applies to people who are on holiday at the time the regs came into force, only applies for the purpose of returning home – not to permit remaining away from home itself

      • SW1V says:
        20 Dec20 December 11:31

        But weren’t they already breaking the law by leaving Tier 3 if their destinations were Tiers 1 or 2?

    • Geoff says:
      20 Dec20 December 11:03

      No, it just makes them spreaders!

  • Charlieface says:
    20 Dec20 December 08:50

    How odd. When a full lockdown (ie including non-essential business) occurs any other time in the year, no worship allowed. When it occurs over a big Christian holiday, all of sudden it’s allowed.

    • TGLoyalty says:
      20 Dec20 December 08:56

      General consensus from the commons debate on lockdown 2 was that banning worship wouldn’t be acceptable in the future. Suspect they’ve decided to listen and risk a revolt.

      • TGLoyalty says:
        20 Dec20 December 08:57

        Rather not risk a revolt*

      • Charlieface says:
        20 Dec20 December 09:13

        But why did it take til Xmas to do that?

        • TGLoyalty says:
          20 Dec20 December 09:56

          Indeed.

          Why were Muslims not allowed bubbles at Eid
          Hindus allowed bubbles at Diwali or Raksha Bandhan (they got a video from Boris grinning and congratulating them on celebrating Diwali virtually instead)
          Sikhs not allowed bubbles at Bandi Chhor Divas
          Jews not allowed bubbles for Hanukkah

          Etc etc.

    • Lady London says:
      20 Dec20 December 13:17

      agreed. Allowing religious gatherings in person now, is medical madness. Which groups is the government pandering to ? Why are the rest of us being locked down making mockery of our sacrifice when these gatherings will spread it anyway ?

  • The real John says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:10

    Why is there a photo of what looks like the Hong Kong MTR?

  • Anna says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:23

    Well, it’s an uncharacteristically suuny morning in our northern Tier 3 area and I’m off for a socially distanced walk with THREE friends AND we are getting take away bacon butties and coffee. See you later, southerners! 🤣

  • ChrisW says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:30

    So… You can fly? If I’m out doing my supermarket shopping near Heathrow and happen to go past the airport on the way home I could jump on a plane wherever I want to go?

    This wording will not stop people travelling. Plenty of people flew to Dubai etc during the Nov lockdown. If they don’t want people boarding flights for frivolous trips, why not just clearly state that in the law? Are they just hoping people might cancel Christmas travel? They won’t. The last lockdown showed that.

    Honestly…. 🙄

    • Daniel says:
      20 Dec20 December 10:48

      My wife and I genuinely have business meetings and some work to do in Dubai Dec-Jan and we made plans to bring our kids with us obviously as we can’t leave them on their own in London. I wonder how we are going to explain that at LHR. Not sure if we need to cancel this trip altogether…

      • Jack says:
        20 Dec20 December 13:43

        Nobody has been asked, from what I can gather. I didn’t fly during second lockdown but I did during first and nobody asked me anything. I do fly on a non-UK passport though.

  • Nick says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:32

    ‘As usual, you should ignore anything said by any Government representative yesterday and focus purely on what is written.’ – I don’t understand, why do you persist in trying to find legal loopholes? This is a bloody dangerous virus for some, sure the mortality risk is mainly in the elderly but long COVID affects mainly younger/middle aged adults, esp women. It is also unpredictable – I personally know two blokes in their late 30s that were previously fit and well and have been in hospital for weeks with our. The government have finally seen sense that having a 5 day free for all would be disastrous. The rise in cases in the USA for Thanksgiving gave a good insight into what might happen. Hospitals across the the south of England are at above 90% capacity. A vaccination programme is being rolled out, let’s just stick with it for the final push. Just accept no travel for a couple more months.

    • jc says:
      20 Dec20 December 12:21

      Agree to a point. ‘Ignore’ might be a strong word to use. But we have seen government officials contradict themselves and each other extensively – at some point we do have to accept that the final authoritative say on what to do and not do needs to be what the law says, and anything the government expects us to do should be included there (and to a lesser but large extent the guidance).

  • Gary Colclough says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:41

    I have a trip to Jamaica booked next month, we are tier 3 at moment

    If we went tier 4 the I reckon I ought to attend the scheme the hotel has for residential lettings inside the complex 😉

  • Joan says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:46

    Why are the British airways lounges at heathrow still open,I was in south galleries lounge on Saturday 19 dec before the tier 4 restrictions and was allowed to order food and drinks which were clearly not for takeaway and it was impossible to keep to the 1 meter rule,so in the airport lounges this is allowed but do this with my own family is not allowed,tried to summit this comment and was told I had already commented on this I didn’t

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