Legality of Leaving the UK as a visitor during the Lockdown
 

Does anyone know where to find information regarding the legality of leaving the UK to travel internationally when you've only been visiting the country (ie non-resident?)

I'm scheduled to fly out to St. Lucia this Friday and, given the Soviet-levels of paperwork I'll be dragging along to make sure I can enter the country, I thought it worthwhile to perhaps try and carry something from Gov.uk/elsewhere that shows visitors *are* allowed to leave the UK in the first place? Not that I expect BA will be checking...

Interesting question. You are allowed to be outside of the place where you are living in order to return home, but I take it that St Lucia is not your home, so as I read it, the exception for returning home would not technically allow you to go to St Lucia.

Are you going there for work, or to fulfil a legal obligation, or to visit a friend or family member in hospital / death bed / jail, or for a wedding / funeral / childcare, or to view / manage residential property, or because you are going to make St Lucia your home? Those are valid reasons to be outside the place where you are living.

From the legislation at https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/...74/schedule/3A

If you're only a visitor to the UK, you don't live in the UK so don't live in a Tier 4 area, so you seemingly aren't covered by any of the lockdown restrictions.

My understanding was that this was only applicable to UK residents - who British or otherwise - are bound by those guidelines.

Thanks for the clarification - yes - I can prove that I'm only visiting with my Schengen residency permit so I don't see why this should be an issue.

Well, the law applies to everybody in England. But Gagravarr has identified that Tier 4 restrictions only apply to Tier 4 residents. This seems like a large loophole if people who do not live in England are legally allowed to travel around England for leisure purposes and gather in large groups.

Yes, also here https://www.gov.uk/guidance/national...n-stay-at-home, it says :"Foreign nationals are subject to the ‘Stay at Home’ regulations. You should not travel abroad unless it is permitted. This means you must not go on holiday.

If you are visiting the UK, you may return home. You should check whether there are any restrictions in place at your destination."

So if you explain that you are just visiting, then I think there should be no problem leaving.

If you are living in the UK (and I do not mean being a UK resident) you are bound by the same restrictions. You should read the word living as encompassing those who are staying in the UK, not just those whose home is here. For someone staying in the UK even as a visitor, this is all still going to apply. Leaving the place you are living in the UK whilst you are here in order to leave the country and return home in itself would be fine, that would it seems be a reasonable excuse to leave the place you are staying. But whilst you are here the laws around leaving the place you are staying, gatherings, and mixing of households will apply to you.

I don't want to pry in to your reasons for coming to the UK, but you must bear in mind if you are visiting relatives/friends that is likely to be against the law for you and/or them. The one thing you can do when you are here and self isolating is stay in a household for the duration of your self isolation rather than stay in a hotel, and you do not need to stay apart from the members of that household. However, you would be unable to mix with other households, and that would include people from other households coming to your place of self isolation to visit you. When you arrive at the UK border and if you are asked what your plans are in the UK, you should bear this in mind.

That's exactly what I'm doing - staying in the same household as relatives and not going anywhere - it's been a weird catch-up - but it has been legal!

This is a rather curious definition of "living". In normal usage, where you live is where you have your home. This need not be the place you are born nor a place where you plan to stay for several years or the foreseeable future with no plans to go elsewhere but it certainly implies that you intend to remain in the place for a prolonged period rather than just a short-term temporary visit. So, it is probably OK to describe a student who is originally from Edinburgh but who spends term-time in London as living in London but, on the other hand, I would not describe somebody ordinarily living in Berlin and temporarily visiting their parents in London for a few weeks as "living in London". This would not correspond to the ordinary meaning of words and, absent any statutory definition, words are normally given in legislation the same meaning as they have in ordinary usage.

It looks to me like an oversight in the current version of the legislation that results from the introduction of tiers into the legislation while borrowing the pre-existing language but, as currently written, the tier 4 restrictions on movement seem not to apply to someone who is ordinarily resident elsewhere and on a temporary visit in a Tier 4 area. Now, would it be sensible to ignore the Tier 4 restrictions on movement if you are from elsewhere and visiting? Probably not, but would it be legal? Arguably yes.