Covid: Plan to reopen Isle of Man border by late June revealed

Unrestricted travel from the UK to the Isle of Man without self-isolation could resume from the end of June.

Under the government's revised exit framework, family could be allowed to visit from early May and non-residents could travel to the island by the end of that month under certain conditions.

All of the changes will be subject to the continued roll-out of vaccines and low Covid-19 infection rates in the UK.

Tynwald will be asked to approve the proposals in the coming days.

The island's border has been closed to almost all non-residents since March 2020.

Chief Minister Howard Quayle said the "careful and incremental" plan would give people and businesses "clarity on the future".

"We have always said that we would not be able to keep our borders restricted for ever," he added.

Under the revised plans, the reopening of the island's border would be done in three stages.

The first would see family, partners and property owners allowed to enter the island from 1 May under a revised testing and isolation regime, while stage two would allow all non-residents to visit under the same conditions from 29 May.

The final stage would see all border restrictions removed with testing and isolation requirements lifted completely from 28 June.

Mr Quayle said "the time had now come" to move into an approach of mitigation "where we increasingly will need to learn to live in a world where the virus is still present around us and may well return to our island".

While the risk another outbreak posed to the Manx community was "still very real", it was "reducing with every passing day" as the vaccine programme roll-out progressed, he said.

"For many, island life will not be back to normal until we are able to once again resume unrestricted travel to and from our island," he added.

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