France has announced it will ease its border restrictions with the UK, raising hopes for summer holidays later this year.
Tourism Minister Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne said arrivals from Britain, Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, Israel and Singapore will no longer need a ‘compelling reason’ to travel due to low or falling cases in those countries.
Lemoyne said other restrictions, including the need for a negative test taken 72 hours before departure, will remain in place.
UK rules banning people from leaving without a legitimate reason will also remain in place until at least May 17, meaning breaks to France will have to wait for now.
Summer holidays in France came a step closer today border restrictions were relaxed, with UK travellers no longer needing a ‘compelling reason’ to visit
Boris Johnson has said he will consider lifting the travel ban in May at the earliest, pending a review by the Global Travel Taskforce which is due to report in April.
Currently, Britons are only allowed to travel abroad for work, volunteering, education, on medical grounds or for funerals.
Travellers have to fill out a form stating their reason for travel and bring it to the airport. Without it, they may be denied boarding and fined £200.
Lemoyne said a decree laying out new French border restrictions will be published on Friday. It is not clear when the rules will come into effect.
Rules for non-European travellers from other countries will also be relaxed slightly, he added.
While those travellers will still need a ‘compelling reason’ for travel, the list of reasons is being expanded to include students coming to take an exam in France, people returning to their principal residence, and families of children in France.
UK arrivals into France have been tightly restricted since the emergence of the Kent variant of coronavirus late last year, amid fears it could spread and worsen infection rates elsewhere.
While the variant is now widespread in the UK, Mr Lemoyne said there is little danger from relaxing border measures because the variant is also widespread in France.
But he added that, in general, he still strongly recommends limiting international travel as much as possible.
France is not the only country to have announced that it is relaxing border restrictions for Britons.
Tourism Minister Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne announced the move Thursday, though UK tourists will still be banned from leaving their own country until at least May 17
From May 1, Cyprus will allow fully-vaccinated people from the UK to enter – though Britons will still be banned from leaving their own country at that point.
Greece and Spain have also said they plan to have ‘vaccine passport’ systems up and running from mid-May, when UK restrictions relax.
The passport system would allow fully-vaccinated Britons to enter the country freely.
Unvaccinated people would still be allowed to enter, according to draft proposals, but may have to take tests or self-isolate for a time on arrival.
EU leaders have agreed to work together on vaccine certificates to kick-start the tourism industry.
British ministers, while reluctant to talk about using digital passports domestically, have said they will help people to get a letter from their doctor if it is needed for travel.
But they have warned that the Continent’s woeful vaccine rollout could mean that freedom of movement is limited.
On Tuesday, Greek tourism minister Harry Theocharis said the country would be open on May 14 to international tourists who are vaccinated, have antibodies or can show proof of a negative Covid test.
Addressing the ITB Berlin trade show, Mr Theocharis said: ‘Our only ambition is to ensure Greece is open to allow anybody who wishes to visit to be able to do so.’
He added that all holidaymakers will be subject to random testing.
It is thought tourists will be able to enter restriction-free after their first jab and children will need to arrive with a negative test. But the final details are still being sorted.
It comes after Greece (pictured), Spain and Cyprus all announced plans to relax border measures with the UK, allowing travel to resume as soon as the British government allows
Greece joined Cyprus which announced a similar proposal for British tourists last week.
The Cypriot deputy tourism minister Savvas Perdios said on Thursday: ‘We have informed the British government that from May 1 we will facilitate the arrival of British nationals who have been vaccinated … so they can visit Cyprus without a negative test or needing to quarantine.’
Visitors would need to be inoculated with vaccines approved by the European Medicines Agency, the tourism minister said.
And the second dose of the vaccine must have been administered at least a week before travel, Perdios added.
Millions of Britons visit Spain, Greece and Cyprus each year to escape to sunny beaches and their tourism industries, ravaged by Covid, rely heavily on British support.
In a single summer month, nearly 10 million Britons can land in Spain, and Brits provide more tourists than any other country.
Nearly four million British tourists normally visit Greece each year, contributing more than £2 billion to the economy.
And in Cyprus, more than a million Britons visit each year – more than from any other country – and the tourism industry accounts for 13 per cent of the Cypriot economy.
Arrivals and earnings from the sector plunged on average 85 per cent last year.