LACK of border and quarantine controls "accelerated" the scale and pace of the coronavirus in the UK leading to "many more people contracting covid-19" a group of MPs has concluded.

An inquiry by the Commons Home Affairs Committee looked at Government's decisions on border measures during the crisis so far, from the early quarantine of 273 people largely from Wuhan, through voluntary self-isolation applying to travellers from specific countries in February and early March; to the "inexplicable" the lifting of all border measures on March 13.

Some 10,000 people with Covid-19 may have entered or returned to the country in March, the committee said.

Committee chairwoman Yvette Cooper said: "The Government's failure to have proper quarantine measures in place in March as the infection was spreading fast was a grave error and meant Covid spread faster and reached more people.

"The UK was almost unique in having no border checks or quarantine arrangements at that time. That alone should have rung loud alarm bells for ministers and made them think again."

Responding to the report, Labour Group Leader, Cllr Nick Peel said “ There have clearly been a catalogue of errors from the Government in how it has dealt with this deadly pandemic.

"However one of the most baffling decisions they made was to continue to allow thousands of Covid positive people to continue to enter the UK, with no quarantine requirement. This is surely a major factor to explain why the UK has the highest death rate per capita of any comparable country.

"The Government need to answer some serious questions on why they made this catastrophic decision.”