Nicola Sturgeon has said the UK Government has been “shambolic” in its handling of ‘air bridges’ with other countries.

The UK Government released a list of 50 countries that it would not quarantine people from when the enter or re-enter the UK from July 10.

It would allow people to go on holiday and not have to self-isolate for 14 days on their return.

Currently the list only applied to England as the Scottish Government has not yet reached a decision on whether it agrees.

Ms Sturgeon indicated it was likely that the Scottish Government would agree on countires like France, Spain, Italy and Germany for no quarantine.

Nicola Sturgeon said that the list of countries that was supplied to the Scottish Government yesterday was not the same as the list revealed today which she described as evidence of the “shifting sands” approach.

She said: “We can’t allow ourselves to be dragged along on other governments, quite frankly, shambolic decision making process.

“We want to welcome visitors from around the world and allow our own citizens to travel. We also want alignment with the rest of the UK but we must make sure we open the country up safely.”

The UK list includes countries with low risk, including France, Spain, Italy and Germany, where reciprocal arrangements will be in place. In other countries where the virus is still high, like the USA, there will still be restrictions.

Ms Sturgeon added: “Measures such as quarantine become more important as level so the virus reduce with the possibility of new cases coming in from outside.

She said it has to be taken into account that the estimates of the rate of infection in Scotland is five times lower than in England, when considering which countries to partner with in an air bridge.

Ms Sturgeon said that the Scottish Government will take a decision in the next few days and added it was likely that it could agree with the  list on low risk countries.

Glasgow Airport said a four nation appraoch was necessary

Derek Provan, chief executive of AGS Airports which owns and manages Glasgow , Aberdeen and Southampton airports, said: “Anything other than a four nations approach to the easing of the quarantine restrictions is going to put further jobs and livelihoods at risk.

“Having a piecemeal approach will compound the devastating impact the blanket quarantine measures have had on our aviation, tourism and hospitality sectors. People are rightly concerned for their health, however, they’re also fearful for their jobs. The introduction of these risk-based measures would allow us to strike the important balance of protecting public health while getting the country and our economy moving again.

“Adopting a different approach is going to do further damage to our aviation sector which has already been buffeted by widespread job losses, and it will have wider, long term implications on the ability of our economy to recover. This isn’t just about people being able to go on a summer holiday, it’s about safely re-establishing the routes that drive trade and investment.”