Stay-at-home restrictions will continue in Wales as the
youngest pupils begin returning to school from Monday, First
Minister confirmed today.
From Monday 22 February, children aged three to seven will begin
returning to schools in a phased way, while some vocational
learners on courses that require practical learning, will return
to college.
Following the latest review of coronavirus restrictions, the
Welsh Government also announced some minor changes to the current
rules:
- From Saturday 20th February, four people from two
different households will be able to meet outdoors for socially
distanced local exercise. This doesn’t apply to private gardens.
- From March 1, the law will be changed to allow licensed
wedding venues, such as visitor attractions and hotels, to
re-open but only to perform wedding and civil partnership
ceremonies.
- Sport Wales will make arrangements for more of our talented
athletes to resume training and playing.
- With more people living and working in older people’s care
homes being vaccinated, we will look again at our guidance for
care home visiting.
The First Minister said:
“I know the last few months of lockdown have been a huge
challenge for so many of us, but I want to thank everyone for
the way we have worked together as a team to drive infection
rates down.
“As coronavirus cases fall, and our successful vaccination
programme protects more people every day, there are reasons to
be optimistic.
“Our youngest learners will begin going back to school from 22
February and, if the situation continues to improve over the
next three weeks, we hope more primary school children and
older students will be able to return from 15 March.
“We are also able to make some very modest changes to the
regulations from 20 February as we take some very cautious
steps to relax some of the strictest lockdown restrictions we
have all been living with for so long.
“We are seeing encouraging green shoots as we move into spring,
with better weather and brighter days ahead, coronavirus cases
falling and our amazing vaccine roll-out continuing at pace. We
have seen, however, time and again the world over, just how
quickly the situation can deteriorate in a matter of weeks.
But, if we work together to keep Wales safe, we will see more
elements of normal life returning.”
The next three-week review of the regulations will also consider
the restrictions around non-essential retail and close contact
services.
The Welsh Government’s
traffic-light Coronavirus Control Plan has been
revised to take account of the emerging new variant strains of
the virus and the impact of the vaccine programme.
