Government ministers have been told they should keep their Christmas and New Year breaks to a minimum as the country moves into a crucial election year.

"/> Government ministers have been told they should keep their Christmas and New Year breaks to a minimum as the country moves into a crucial election year.

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NICOLAS SARKOZY

Sarkozy warns ministers against long holidays

Government ministers have been told they should keep their Christmas and New Year breaks to a minimum as the country moves into a crucial election year.

Published: 23 December 2011 08:15 CET
Sarkozy warns ministers against long holidays
World Economic Forum

Daily newspaper Le Figaro reported on Friday that President Sarkozy issued his instructions at a cabinet meeting on Wednesday.

“You should go away for the minimum amount of time and as close as possible [to Paris] and stay 100 percent ready during the holidays,” the newspaper reported him as saying.

Ministers seem to be largely obeying the edict, with most claiming they will shuttle between Paris and their constituency homes.

With both Christmas and New Year falling on weekends this year there are no public holidays in France at all during the holiday season.

The president himself will stay close to Paris by staying in his official residence of La Lanterne in the western suburb of Versailles.

Prime minister Francois Fillon will “shuttle backwards and forwards between Paris and La Sarthe,” where he has his constituency, according to an official spokesman.

Ministers have been busy as the country grapples with the eurozone crisis, a series of airport strikes and the ongoing threat to the country’s triple A rating.

2012 is a critical year with presidential elections due to take place in late April and parliamentary elections shortly afterwards. President Sarkozy currently trails his leading opponent in the polls, Socialist Francois Hollande.

One minister told the newspaper that such a demand from the president was only to be expected.

“French people are worried,” said Edouard Courtial, the minister for French people abroad. “We have fought to get here and we shouldn’t complain.”

He himself will take “four days of recuperation in Auvergne” where he plans to “sleep, read, go for walks with my children and watch TV.”

Certain ministers will need to be on duty over the festive period.

Interior minister Claude Guéant will spend New Year’s Eve monitoring events with police officers. Health minister Xavier Bertrand will visit hospitals at the same time.

Most ministers appeared to be sticking to their boss’s decree, although occasional bursts of defiance were in evidence.

According to colleagues, one minister plans to “take off for Dubai on Wednesday and spend ten days there with his family.” Perhaps to help him keep his job, Le Figaro chose not to name the sun-seeking rebel.

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TRAVEL

Denmark opens way for summer trips to holiday islands

Denmark has opened up for self-isolation-free travel to a long list of European holiday islands, with the Balearics, Canary Islands, Azores, Madeira and Malta all classed as "yellow" in the updated travel restrictions issued on Friday.

Published: 14 May 2021 19:50 CEST
Denmark opens way for summer trips to holiday islands
Danes will now be able to travel and return to the Playa de las Américas resort on Tenerife without self-isolation. Photo: Arnstein Rønning/Wikimedia Commons

Under the third phase of travel reopening which came into force at midnight on Thursday, those travelling from EU or Schengen countries classed as “yellow” no longer need to self-isolate on arrival in Denmark, meaning the change will allow Danes to return easily to some of the most popular holiday destinations. 

READ ALSO: Denmark eases travel restrictions: EU tourists can now come to Denmark

“This is the first time since before Christmas that you can now actually go on a regular holiday trip to destinations where we would all actually like to go on holiday,” Erik Brøgger Rasmussen, a director at Denmark’s foreign ministry, told the Ritzau newswire. “It’s not a huge reopening, but it is the first for many months.”

Most of the new regions now rated “yellow” in the revised travel guidelines released on Friday afternoon are Spanish, including the Balearic Islands (Mallorca, Ibiza etc), the Canary Islands (Gran Canaria, Lanzarote, Tenerife etc), the North African enclave of Ceuta, Asturia, Extremadura, Galicia, Murcia, and Valencia.

In Portugal, the Azores and Madeira are now rated “yellow”, as is the entire island nation of Malta. 

Rasmussen pointed out that all of the holiday areas which have been opened up for isolation-free travel are also open for travel from Denmark.

“The ones I have mentioned are also open at the other end, so to speak,” he said. “Portugal as a whole is also so low [in cases] that infection is not a problem. But they do not want us in at the moment, so we are not going to open up to the whole country.”

The changes come into force at 4pm on May 15th.

The only other change in travel guidelines was for travel from Nepal, which has now been rated a “red” country due to the prevalence of the new “Indian variant” of coronavirus.

“Nepal currently has a high infection rate, and as the variant of concern B.1.617 is now seen as widespread in several Indian states bordering Nepal, there is a high risk that B.1.617 may have spread to Nepal and be contributing to the current high incidence,” the foreign ministry said. “This means there is also a presumed high risk of travellers from Nepal importing this variant.”

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