People going on holidays face €500 fine from today

It will come into effect from today.

New rules regarding travel will start today that will see anyone trying to travel for leisure or non essential reasons fined €500. This comes as the government try to look for more solutions to battle the rising number of Covid cases amongst the Irish population. According to the Irish Times Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly last signed the first of the regulations last night that will set in place measures relating to travel. These measures were decided on by Government on Tuesday. An increased fine of €500 will apply to people caught travelling to a port or airport to leave the State without essential reasons from today February 1st. As well as fines for those trying to leave the country new measures are being drawn up regarding mandatory quarantining for those entering the country. A spokesman for Mr Donnelly confirmed that work was being done to put these new measures into place alongside the €500 travel fine;

"Work on other regulations around mandatory quarantine and the operation of same is continuing and should be completed in the coming days."

The mandatory quarantining will be at a designated facility for passengers who cannot provide a negative pre-departure Covid-19 test. The quarantining rules will also apply to those travelling from countries such as Brazil and South Africa due to new variants of the virus there. Meanwhile work is being done to figure out how travel can be stopped across the Northern Irish border with Garda checkpoints 5km from the Border to crack down on non-essential travel between the two jurisdictions. With all of these new travel restrictions many have questioned Taoiseach Micheál Martin's plans to visit new US president Joe Biden for the traditional handing over of shamrock on St Patrick's Day this year. The Taoiseach has alluded to looking forward to the visit but as yet has not confirmed that it is to go forward in light of recent Covid precautions in Ireland.