Nowhere is safer than a cruise ship right now – it’s time this £10 billion industry restarted

My suggestion for the new round of talks, for what it is worth, is how well cruise restarts have gone in the Med, Australia, the South Pacific, the Canary Islands and Asia. Ships are sailing safely in all those regions while we still talk.

Or how about all the hoops cruise lines have jumped through to ensure ships are Covid-free. All crew quarantined before going near passengers and continually tested. Passengers unable to board ships without a negative swab and then tested regularly. In some cases, now the vaccine is here, proof of two jabs needed. Masks to be worn indoors, no cosying up to strangers and trips ashore allowed only on ship’s tours so folk don’t step outside the bubble.

I doubt there is anywhere safer than a cruise ship right now, except perhaps the Mars Rover. Yet the Foreign Office shows no signs of lifting its ban on ocean cruises even though it is wildly out of date, having been slapped on last March when the world knew little of this new disease.

It’s pure madness. Cruise is an industry, let us not forget, worth £10 billion a year to the UK economy and providing employment for tens of thousands of people: cruise staff, travel agents, port staff, catering companies and more.

With the economy in a parlous state, you’d think getting ships and passengers back to sea would be high on the government’s must-do list. But then again you might think they’d have learned something from all that talking last year. Clearly they haven’t.

Travel agents, tour operators and airlines are delighted by the roadmap. So they should be. Just the mention that international travel is back on the cards has sparked a bookings bonanza for UK and overseas holidays. Covid be damned. We’re all desperate to escape our four walls and boxset binges.

But look what happened last July. The doors to Europe opened and we were allowed to cram onto planes and pile into hotels, but cruise continued to be treated as a pariah despite all the evidence to the contrary. That must not happen again.

Unlike lightbulbs, ships can’t be turned off and on at the flick of a switch. It’ll be a miracle if the taskforce does report on April 12 but if it does, it’s too late. Signposts along the roadmap need concreting in place now showing when UK waters will open so companies can plan and Brits can cruise again. I know I am not the only one who cannot wait.