3rd July 2020
Commenting on the UK Government’s plan for quarantine-free travel from 50 ‘low-risk’ countries, Dr Liz Cameron, OBE, Chief Executive of the Scottish Chambers of Commerce said:
“The lack of a four-nations approach to the easing of quarantine restrictions is hugely disappointing and damaging. At this time, this is sending a message that Scotland is not yet open for business and will leave us struggling to interpret what this means for tourism and international trade. Businesses will continue to struggle as long as the suggestion is out there that Scotland somehow may have separate quarantine restrictions and that the necessary balance between health and jobs is somehow seen differently north of the border.
“This could have a severe risk of further damaging the aviation sector in Scotland which has already been widely affected by this ongoing crisis in terms of job losses and impair on their ability to support the long term recovery of our economy if they cannot support the routes to investment and trade that businesses need.
“Complex policy variations and piecemeal measures simply confuse Scottish businesses, its global trading partners and the people of Scotland more widely. At a time when businesses hope to capture pent-up demand after months of devastating losses, there has never been a more important moment to show that we are ready and ‘open for business’ again.
“We urge the Scottish Government to commit to align with a UK-wide approach. In the light of current and expected job losses, we need the Scottish Government to make their decision as a matter of urgency hopefully not creating further divergence. Politics must be put to one side by all in order to give Scottish businesses the ability to drive up demand and do what they do best, making Scotland the best place to invest and do business.’’
