Wales – Coach Tours and Holidays to Local Lockdown Areas

01 October 2020

Whilst the guidance for areas in local lockdown in England is clear (see our article here), there has been considerable confusion concerning travel to those areas in local lockdown in Wales.

Following extensive discussions with Welsh Government and Visit Wales, the Confederation of Passenger Transport (CPT) has now confirmed that the view of Visit Wales is that the restrictions in local lockdown areas apply to both residents of the area and visitors from outside the area.

This means:

• Travel in, to or from the area is restricted to anyone with “reasonable excuse”.  Holidays will not be considered to be a reasonable excuse so scheduled tours to anywhere in a lockdown area must not operate
• Tours due to depart and which are due to arrive before lockdown restrictions apply, should not depart unless they have already done so
• Tours in the area at the start of lockdown restrictions (6pm on Thursday for Llandudno), should leave as soon as is practical

Visit Wales have confirmed that hotels are allowed to remain open but they can only legally accept customers with a reasonable excuse to stay there. They are therefore required to cancel any holiday bookings that they have previously accepted.

CPT has an ongoing dialogue with Visit Wales in relation to this matter and will keep members updated of any developments.  For further information about this issue, or about how to join CPT, contact Backhouse Jones’ Regulatory team on 01254 828300 or regulatory@backhouses.co.uk