>> There is no such thing as an exemption card or letter, though you can print
>> off a sunflower lanyard if you like. We have a whole load of unenforceable guidelines
>> and a bunch of woolly legislation. Why the civil service was unable to draft something
>> suitable and enforceable I do not know, but that’s where we are.
The stuff on the .gov website is, I think, analogous to the Highway Code. Where it covers legal requirements it uses must/shall. Guidance uses should. You may travel for exercise but should not travel outside your local area.
The law is set out in successive Statutory Instruments. The instrument dealing with face coverings is here:
www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2020/791/contents/made
Regulation 3 sets out what is required; subject to some exemptions like under 11s No person may, without reasonable excuse, enter or remain within a relevant place without wearing a face covering.
Regulation 4 provides a non-exhaustive list of 'reasonable excuses' including both physical and mental health, providing assitance, lip reading, eating or taking medication etc.
There's no requirement to carry a card or badge to confirm the existence of an individual's own reasonable excuse. To require one with the implication of it requiring evidence of a particular condition would have placed an utterly unreasonable demand on GPs etc.
Mrs B finds wearing one quite difficult, particularly if exerting herself - for example climbing multiple flights of stairs. In the summer for example she got quite distressed getting up from the lowest car deck to the passenger spaces on a P&O ferry She also has some mental health/psychological difficulty with masks (but not visors).
We've considered getting her a Sunflower lanyard but not yet done so. If she chose to remove a mask I'd expect a member of (say) supermarket staff to accept, without expansion into precise reasons, except to say that it was her health that at face value.
If it escalated and police got involved then it would be reasonable for an officer or PCSO to question her in more detail as to the 'reasonable excuse' relied on. If they were not satisfied then I don't think she'd accept a fixed penalty; a day trip to the Magistrates Court would be in order.
If they'd wanted two, rather than going to the press, the young ladies out for a 'picnic' in Derbyshire could have let it go to court.
|
