Boris’s French quarantine makes no sense

Covid-19 has brought us a Dunkirk spirit alright. Once again we have hundreds of thousands of Brits in a mad scramble to get back to Britain from France, as soon as a flotilla of ships will let them. It is just that this time around it feels a little more self-inflicted than last time. Have ministers learned nothing from the fiasco of Spain a couple of weeks ago? Holidaymakers then were given a few hours notice before quarantine rules were brought in, leaving many desperately trying to book flights at horribly inflated prices or else risk having to self-isolate for 14 days upon their return. It went so well that the government has repeated it with France, where 450,000 Britons are currently thought to be on holiday.

If ministers were deliberately trying to annoy voters, they could hardly do any better. If Covid-19 is rising in France at a rate that justifies a return to quarantine, why could those already in France not be given a week or twos notice – and asked not to visit the most-affected towns and cities in the interim? That would have been a measured response.