THE SCOTTISH Government is not planning on backing up guidance limiting Scots travelling more than five miles with new laws, the Justice Secretary has confirmed.
After the lockdown was eased into phase one of the Scottish Government’ roadmap to exit the Covid-19 crisis, Nicola Sturgeon stressed that a five-mile limit on people travelling for exercise and leisure could be place in law, as she issued a stern warning about Scots flocking to beauty spots.
But with more Scots now adhering to the rules, Justice Secretary Humza Yousaf confirmed to MSPs that there are no plans to ramp up any laws to help enforce the guidance.
Speaking in Holyrood, Mr Yousaf said: "I am in regular contact with the Chief Constable about public behaviour and levels of compliance.
READ MORE: Coronavirus: Less than five per cent of Police Scotland's workforce tested for Covid-19
"The Scottish Government does not consider it to be necessary at this time to create new offences to enforce the rules, however, we will continue to monitor the situation and not hesitate to legislate or indeed put existing guidance into regulation if necessary."
He added: “The overwhelming majority of people are acting in line with the rules.
"I would like to take this opportunity to simply record my thanks to these who are playing a vital role in reducing the spread of the virus. I cannot stress enough how important it is that people follow the rules, the R number remains precariously close to one and we're at a very critical stage."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel