Flouting coronavirus restrictions risks return to full lockdown, First Minister Nicol Sturgeon warns
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THE prospect of full lockdown being reimposed in Scotland is a possibility if a minority of people continue to flout newly eased restrictions.
That was the sobering message from First Minister Nicola Sturgeon today after reports that the new guidelines aimed at making life a little easier for people had been ignored by some with almost 800 being dispersed by police over the weekend – five times the number the previous weekend.
Traffic movements were also up by as much as 70 per cent, prompting Ms Sturgeon to say it was hard to see how it could all have been accounted for by local traffic.
At today's Scottish Government briefing she acknowledged that the vast majority of people were obeying the rules, but nevertheless warned that, if the trend of ignoring guidance continued, then harsher restrictions on movement would have to be made law.
She described the progress made against the virus so far as “fragile” and “not irreversible".
Making her frustration at the situation plain she said: “It is still the case that every day I have to stand here and confirm the loss of life.
“I know that the vast majority of people stuck to the rules and I want to thank you sincerely for that, you stayed outdoors in small groups and you stayed more than two metres away from other householders, so again my thanks to you for that.
“It has also been clear that over the weekend not everybody stuck to the rules.
"I'm told by the police that on Saturday alone there were 797 dispersals – and that is people being moved on for not complying with the rules.
“To give some context to that, 797 is five times higher than the figure of previous Saturday.
"There were also clearly cases where, despite the guidance we issued, people were driving more than five miles to beauty spots.
"On Saturday on the A82 by Loch Lomond traffic was around three times higher than it was the previous Saturday, and we saw a similar picture around Glencoe.
“I am going to be very blunt here – it is very hard to see how all of that can have been caused by local residents or by people travelling a reasonable distance to meet loved ones. So we will be considering all of that as we must do in assessing the impact of the phase one changes.
“Last week, we deliberately allowed some flexibility when we changed the lockdown restrictions. We recommended that people don’t travel more than five miles for recreation but we left room for some discretion so that you can go further to visit family.
“We also strongly recommended that when two households meet there should be no more than eight people in total in a group, but again we put that into guidance rather than into law because we do trust, and continue to trust, the majority to keep those groups small and to stay within the rules.
“But it is worth being clear, in fact I have a duty to be clear with you: if there is continued evidence of even a minority not abiding by these guidelines and travelling unnecessarily, if people meet up in larger groups, and if they are making journeys which risk spreading the virus, we will have to put these restrictions on group size and travel distance into law and we won't hesitate to do that if we think that is necessary for the collective safety and wellbeing of the population.
“Of course, I should make clear that the stipulation that no more than two households meets at any one time is already the law and will be enforced by the police.
"The reason I'm stressing all this, the real danger we still face, is not because I want to be imposing these restrictions, but it is because the progress we've made so far in tackling Covid-19 is simply not guaranteed and it is not irreversible.
“Cases could increase again. It wouldn't take too much for that to happen rather than continuing to decrease, and if that happens then that will result in more loss of life – and if all of that happens restrictions will have to be reimposed rather than being further relaxed.
“But the only way of avoiding that is for all of us to comply with the rules.”
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