COVID-19 UPDATE

NEWS SPECIAL

SCOTTISH EASING MOVES UP A GEAR ON MONDAY

THE SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT HAS ANNOUNCED SIGNIFICANT COVIDRESTRICTIONS EASING ACROSS RETAIL, HOSPITALITY AND TRAVELFROM MONDAY.

Scotland’s faster-thanexpected journey out of Covid restrictions has continued with an announcement from First Minister Nicola Sturgeon this week that there will be “significant easing of restrictions across retail, hospitality and travel” from Monday.

Hospitality venues such as cafés, pubs and restaurants can reopen, along with tourist accommodation as all parts of the country will move to Level 3. Non-essential retail outlets and close contact services such as beauty salons can also reopen, in addition to indoor attractions and public buildings.

The remaining travel restrictions within Scotland will be lifted and travel within the UK will be permitted for any purpose. If everyone continues to follow the rules, it is expected that all of Scotland will move to Level 2 on Monday 17 May.

Sturgeon said: “The changes that come into force next week have been hard earned by all of us. I know that many will be looking forward to their first drink in a beer garden, to catching up with a friend in a café, or to going on holiday somewhere in Scotland.

“But even as we enjoy those moments, we still need to be careful. We must remember the virus is more infectious now than it was when bars and cafés were last open, so we must still stick to the rules.”

BESTWAY DONATES 80 TONNES OF FLOUR

Bestway Wholesale has donated over 80 tonnes of self-raising flour to The Felix Project, a London based charity that uses surplus food to help people in poverty and need. The flour has been sent to hundreds of charities across London.

Dawood Pervez, MD at Bestway Wholesale said, “We chose to donate the flour to this wonderful charity because as we know it will help many other charities across London right in the communities that Bestway serves. Frighteningly, 1.5 million adults and 400,000 children go hungry and we need to do everything we can to help make this change.”

GIST TRIALS ENGINELESS ELECTRIC REFRIGERATED TRAILERS

Temperature-controlled logistics specialist Gist is trialling the UK’s first fully autonomous, all-electric engineless refrigerated trailer system.

The unit uses a battery to power the fridge system which gets recharged using kinetic energy fom the trailer’s axle when the vehicle is moving.

Unlike current setups, this loop creates a fully autonomous system that produces no direct carbon dioxide or particulate emissions. The fridge is lighter than a standard fridge and associated red diesel fuel tank, and very quiet.