Up to a million Britons stranded abroad are still scrambling to return to the UK amid the coronavirus pandemic – including 6,000 marooned in New Zealand and thousands trapped in Peru.
The government has been urging against all foreign travel and for people to make their own way back for more than a week, but many have found it difficult to get tickets after many commercial flights have been cancelled.
New Zealand has imposed one of the strictest lockdowns of any country to battle the deadly disease, and has grounded international flights, leaving thousands of Brits, including doctors and nurses, desperate to get home.
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has called Winston Peters, New Zealand’s Deputy Prime Minister, to ask for assistance in getting Brits home.
Mr Raab is also expected to announce a huge repatriation effort today amid mounting fears over safety.
RAF voyager transport planes could be deployed to bring UK citizens home from places such as India and Peru, where conditions are thought to be deteriorating.
It comes as two repatriation flights carrying British passengers from Peru have landed at Heathrow Airport.
The British Airways flights left Lima on Sunday and landed at the west London hub on Monday morning.
Casi Cartwright and Lewis Dafydd who are currently stranded in Peru, like many other Brits
British critical care nurse Rachel Brockbank is stuck in Christchurch due to lockdown after visiting with family for sister’s wedding
The Foreign Office has not said how many passengers were on board, but said two more flights will leave Peru on Monday, arriving in the UK on Tuesday.
The repatriation flights were arranged by the Foreign Office in partnership with British Airways to rescue more than 1,000 stranded Britons.
Since the outbreak of coronavirus in Wuhan, the Foreign Office has helped to bring home almost 1,400 people on specially chartered Government flights from China and Peru and 1,900 people on cruise ships from places including California, Brazil and Japan.
In the last week, the Foreign Office has helped more than 4,000 people to get back from Jamaica and more than 8,500 people to get back from Morocco.
Around 5,000 Britons successfully left Bali after the British team in Indonesia worked with their counterparts to unblock a visa permissions issue.
A number Britons in New Zealand are using social media to call on the government, and specific airlines to get them safely home.
The party of eight tourists – including young children – are trapped in Goa, thousands of miles from home, while their supplies of medicine and food dwindle
A British family have been left stranded in India after their flight home was cancelled due to Coronavirus.
The party of eight tourists – including young children – are trapped in Goa, thousands of miles from home, while their supplies of medicine and food dwindle.
Despite efforts to contact the British Embassy, the family say they have had “no sign of help” as their holiday in paradise turns into a living nightmare.
They also claim to have been attacked by stick-wielding Indian police officers who told them “we can beat you now, no-one will care” when they left their hotel to try to buy food.
An online petition to try to get the group home has already gathered hundreds of signatures.
Mother-of-two Chanttel Carrington, from Isle of Sheppey in Kent, said: “We are stranded with little money, and three of our party members are in need of prescribed medication.
“We have tried to contact the British Embassy multiple times with no success.
“There is no sign of help or support whatsoever.”
Other group members include Ms Carrington’s children Ivy-rose McCoy, six, and son George McCoy, four, as well as her partner Barney McCoy.
The rest are Ms Carrington’s parents Gary and Denise Carrington, aged 59 and 56 respectively, her sister Charley Carrington, 19, and Charley’s 18-year-old boyfriend Luke Manning.
They had gone on holiday to the coastal state of Goa, but their flight home last Monday, March 23, was cancelled as travel chaos amid the pandemic continued to snowball.
Ms Carrington claimed that she and Mr McCoy received rough treatment from local police when they went to get medication and food for their children, and were ordered back to their hotel.
She added: “We went to the shops to get some medicine and also some food for our children the police attacked my partner with sticks when we attempted to try and buy food and medicine.”
Crispian Wilson at the Foreign Office has said that commercial routes are the only practical option for many Brits stranded abroad
The children saw the spectacle and Ms Carrington said: “My son was crying and said are we going to die in this hotel?
“The hotel is running out of food and the kids are starting to get poorly and distressed with the situation.”
Brits in New Zealand are using Twitter to try and get home by appealing to airlines and politicians.
A user Twitter user called Fen said: ‘Waking up to an email from @EmilyThornberry is the one thing that has given me hope that I will be able to return home. I can’t thank her enough for what she is trying to do for us all.’
And Shannon Rickards, said: ‘When @qatarairways have the chance to literally become THE BEST AIRLINE IN THE if they step up and get people home. Unlike who many of us will never fly with again. #britsinNZ #getushome.
Dr Marion Lynch is one of many medical professionals currently in the country and has implored the government to get them home so they can help battle the coronavirus.
And critical care nurse Rachel Brockbank is currently stuck in New Zealand after visiting with her family for her sister’s wedding, but is desperate to get home.
She told the New Zealand Herald: ‘I want to go back. I don’t think my family want me to but I feel that’s where I should be. That’s where I’m needed.’
Reece Hall, 24, from Cornwall, fell victim to a mugging and serious assault on February 26 in north Goa, leaving him with a fractured jaw, eye socket and leg injury, now severely infected
Heidi Hawkins, 49, a carer from West Sussex (pictured with her grandchild) is stuck in south Goa and said she is afraid to go out for food due to police brutality
Twitter user Fen is one of those stranded in New Zealand and is asking the UK government for help
Labour MP Emily Thornberry tweeted today about Mr Raab’s expected repatriation plan
The Foreign Office has projected between 300,000 and one million Brits are currently trapped abroad, but there is no exact figure available as there is no method in place to be able to track everybody.
The latest effort emerged as the UK’s high commissioner in Australia, Vicky Treadell, warned there are at least 30,000 Britons in the country and a few planes ‘won’t do it’.
She tweeted: ‘Brits across Australia so no single point of departure. Keeping key airports and commercial airlines providing 1000s of seats between them is therefore our current priority.’
In the Philippines a Brit stranded abroad fears his wife and unborn baby will die because he claims the British Embassy is refusing to help the family get to hospital.
Desperate Tom Shelton’s Philippino wife Annie is eight months pregnant with his first baby.
She needs a Caesarean because their unborn son is upside down in the breech position.
But the couple, who have been running a guesthouse in El Nido, in the Philippines for the last two years, are now a six-hour drive away from hospital because of restrictions enforced to stop the spread of Covid-19.
Tom, 43, from Consett, Durham, says the British Embassy won’t help because his wife is not a British citizen.
He claims they have offered to support the family once the baby – who will be British – is born but Tom fears by then it could be too late.
The struggling family are now living in a hut to save money and depending on neighbours for food after the spread of coronavirus destroyed their livelihood.
‘My baby could die because of the lockdown,’ Tom said.
‘Annie is due on April 17 but could go into labour at any time, especially with all the stress of the situation.
‘The baby is feet first and its head could get stuck if she ends up giving birth at home with no assistance. My baby and my wife’s lives are at risk and yet no one will help me.’
British Nationals stuck in India said their plight is becoming ‘desperate’, with some claiming they have faced police brutality while attempting to get food and medical supplies.
Reece Hall, 24, a ground worker from Cornwall, fell victim to a mugging and serious assault on February 26 in Titos Lane, north Goa, leaving him with a fractured jaw, eye socket and a leg injury, which has now become severely infected.
Unable to leave his accommodation for regular treatment due hostility towards tourists and strict government lock down measures, in place since Wednesday, Mr Hall’s open leg wound, which was caused when three muggers pushed him from his bike, is now badly inflamed.
Mr Hall said: ‘I’ve been avoid going outside ever since seeing videos of people getting beaten up and hearing stories from foreigners who have been beaten, (…) my leg is not looking good at the moment’.
‘I’m desperate to get a plane ticket home but it’s gone past the point of trying to get one now as they are all cancelled, all we can do is contact government officials. I’m surviving off one meal of rice a day.’
A 21-day lock down was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday causing the immediate closure of shops, restaurants and many hotels.
Heidi Hawkins, 49, a carer from West Sussex stuck in south Goa, said: ‘The supermarket was rumoured to be open and it was heaving, no social distancing, every man for himself.
‘The police just came along and started smacking people with their sticks. So people are too scared to go out for food. When you hear of a shop that’s open you’re too scared to go there because of the police brutality.
‘We just need food and water and we’ve been left with no information.
‘I went to the police station in Colva to ask for information and the police threatened to put me behind bars. I was laughed at and ridiculed.’
‘At home i’ve got my 22-year-old daughter who is highly anxious alone with her eight-week-old baby, her four-year-old daughter and my 19-year-old disabled daughter. She’s been stuck inside without food. While my 19-year-son, who is severely disabled is in an assisted living house and he is desperately homesick and doesn’t understand.
‘I am desperate to get to him and take him home. I need to get home for my babies, they need their mum.’
British National, Lyn Davis, 60, who is also stuck in Goa and has been visiting the region for almost 20 years, claims she was assaulted by police in the area with a bamboo baton for leaving her hotel to collect medication she had ordered the day before.
Jay Vernon a yoga teacher from Brighton is currently stuck in Varkala, Kerala. He said he is yet to hear back from the Foreign Office
Mrs Davis said: ‘Went to the chemists in Candolim this morning (…) police were very aggressive at Calangute roundabout. We tried explaining that we had ordered medication but the police woman hit me hard on the bottom with her stick, had my phone in my hand and told her that was assault.
‘They carried on shouting and waved us through, also as we were coming up to them you could see her getting ready swinging her stick around. I’ve been coming to India for nearly 20 years, do I want to come back? Not so sure now.’
Jay Vernon a yoga teacher from Brighton is currently stuck in Varkala, Kerala, after having two flights he had booked cancelled and no response from the British Embassy.
Mr Vernon said: ‘My two flights have been cancelled and no one has yet to reply from the Embassy. Locals are not wanting to associate with me because I’m from Europe. I still can’t understand why the Indian government doesn’t allow us to leave and their own citizens back in the country.’
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab (pictured in Downing Street earlier this month) is expected to announce a huge repatriation effort as early as tomorrow amid mounting fears over safety
Since the 21-day lock down was announced on Wednesday by Prime Minister Narendra Modi thousands of people, mostly young male day labourers but also families, fled their New Delhi homes as the measure effectively put millions of Indians who live off daily earnings out of work.
Construction projects, taxi services, housekeeping and other informal sector employment came to a sudden halt.
Mr Modi said the extreme measure was needed to halt the spread of Covid-19 in India, which has confirmed 775 cases and 19 deaths, and where millions live in cramped conditions without regular access to clean water.
India’s finance ministry announced a 1.7trillion (£18billion) economic stimulus package that will include delivering grains and lentil rations for three months to 800 million people, around 60 per cent of the world’s second-most populous country.
But thousands of India’s most vulnerable, who fear dying not of the disease caused by the new virus but rather of starvation, have decided not to wait.