Government departments clash over ‘lack of answers’ on quarantine

A number of Government departments have raised new concerns about plans to extend the mandatory hotel quarantine regime to a range of European countries, it has emerged.

A fresh dispute emerged following a meeting on Tuesday of seven Government departments which was designed to find agreement on how to handle passengers travelling from countries such as France, Germany and Italy.

It is understood at least four departments expressed concerns about what has been described by sources as a lack of a clear plan around how to increase the capacity within the system.

The meeting of senior officials included the Department of the Taoiseach as well as the departments of health, transport, foreign affairs, defence, justice and enterprise.

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It is understood the latter four departments all raised concerns about what one source said was a “lack of answers to fundamental and basic questions” about how to expand the system.

While there were no Ministers at the meeting, the growing rift between the Department of Health and other key departments is being viewed as politically significant.

It is understood that the main issues which arose on Tuesday are in relation to practical questions around how much capacity will be available for an expected increase in passengers if the regime is extended to European countries of concern.

There were also questions raised around the need to strengthen the passenger locator form. It is understood that there is some resistance in Government to the mooted suggestion of enhanced checks for people on home quarantine instead of mandatory hotel quarantine for the additional countries.

There is also strong resistance to imposing a cap on arrivals.

The Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly played down reported divisions in Government on the question of expanding mandatory quarantine.

“I know there is a depiction that Cabinet is somehow at loggerheads on this but we really aren’t,” he told RTÉ’s Prime Time on Tuesday. “Simon Coveney and I want the best answer for Ireland.”

Responding to the inter-departmental meeting on the subject, he said he was not on his own regarding an expansion of affected countries.

“The advice we have that is of particular concern to me, and indeed to Simon Coveney and indeed to everybody else, is the variant of concern countries,” he said, naming Austria, France, Germany and Italy.

However, regarding hotel capacity, he said 20,000 Irish citizens living across some of those countries would not travel home at the same time and the idea of short-term hotel quarantining was to dissuade people from travelling here.

“We will have enough hotel rooms for whatever countries we decide to add,” he said.

Extension of system

Talks on extending the system are likely to continue in the coming days between officials and at political level, and sources said that there is pressure on all sides to find an agreement ahead a Cabinet meeting next week.

Last week, Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly attempted to include the US, France, Italy and other EU countries on the quarantine list but faced opposition from other Government Ministers.

Both Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney and Tánaiste Leo Varadkar said last week that there were practical, logistical and potentially legal issues around the plans.

Attorney General Paul Gallagher also wrote to Mr Donnelly flagging issues with the proposals.

The Department of Health last week announced the extension of mandatory hotel quarantine to 26 countries and states instead of the 43 that had been recommended by the travel advisory group.

The extended list of high-risk countries came into effect yesterday. People arriving from the additional countries, including Israel, Nigeria and Serbia, must now book a space in the State’s hotel quarantine system.

To date 351 rooms have been booked by people required to quarantine in the hotel system. Some 96 travellers, either individuals or families, stayed in quarantine hotel rooms in the last week of March when the requirements came into force. There were 236 rooms booked for April, and 19 rooms booked so far so May, according to the Department of Health.