Norfolk travel companies welcome easing of Covid travel restrictions
Fully vaccinated people no longer need to take tests when they get back
Travel companies in Norfolk are welcoming the easing of international Covid restrictions by the Government.
From today, people who are fully vaccinated will no longer need to take post-arrival lateral flow tests, which usually cost around £20 each.
Un-vaccinated people won't need to self-isolate anymore, but they will still have to take tests.
Christina Fitzpatrick, is the Managing Director of Holiday With Us, based in Wisbech, she told us it's already having an effect on customer confidence locally: "The surge that we've seen, it started to creep up on us a couple of weeks a go and slowly we've seen it get a little bit more and more.
"The closer we've been getting and got to this date, we've started to see calls come in quite rapidly".
Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to make the most of the rule changes and get away last minute for the half term week.
Turkey, Egypt and Portugal are among the most popular short-haul destinations, while departures to the US state of Florida, Dubai, Mexico and the Caribbean have sold well for longer-haul holidays, according to Abta.
Ski resorts in France, Italy and Switzerland are also in demand.
Ms Fitzpatrick went on to say that travel red lists and mandatory quarantine must never return: "I don't think these measures can be put in place again because if they are, it will just send everybody backwards.
"The Government keeps on saying we need to live with Covid. We as an industry we certainly need to do that because we have been one of the most hardest hit by all this. If we are going to have a bounce back it needs to be a real one with no more restrictions".
But she concluded by saying that some confusion remains and there's work for the Government still to do: "People understand that restrictions are being eased by the UK, but obviously they are still very confused about what countries they can travel to. Some countries don't allow those who are unvaccinated in, without a PCR test.
"While we have other countries that are allowing a majority of people in as long as they have been fully vaccinated. So giving us some support so we can give the consumer a clearer message would be great.
"We also need the Government to negotiate with other countries, to put pressure on them to ease their rules. You look around the world and many countries are easing their rules.
"But our Government needs to be more proactive and applying more pressure onto these countries to make sure their rules against us are eased now our cases are coming down and the vast majority of us have been vaccinated".