travel to second homes during the corona virus

I think with everything we do at the moment we have to ask ourselves if we are putting ourselves in danger or are we possibly putting someone else in danger. The rules are there for people that are incapable of working that out. We’re the only ones that can spread the virus.

I would add you cannot, in a situation like we are in now, have rules that are applied on a person by person basis. You need universal laws that apply to everyone.

I would expect that if someone visiting a second home for a good reason that fell within the National Guidance guidelines, which would include, for example, your main residence being burnt down or flooded, so you would be homeless unless you went there, they woud not be fined and I would imagine if a second home had been flooded or in anyway severely damaged a visit would be allowed.

No

Peasblossom
The example of one person who has had no contact with others and goes to a second home in the middle of nowhere, doesn’t really have relevance (except to that one person) in terms of the current restrictions, because it applies to very, very few.

So, if you are one of these people, is it alright to break the lockdown rules?

I'm wondering if this post is actually about people visiting their second homes during lockdown or if it is about second home ownership in general.

There is a lot to be said on either side of the second home issue. Not least, are we talking about people having two places in which they live, or are we talking about people who own more than one property and rent out the ones they don't live in, either as holiday homes or to people who can't afford to buy their own home?
The issue is very complicated.
My idea of a good holiday is living for a short time in a different place, so I love it that others own holiday properties.
If nobody had any houses they could let out where would all those who can't afford to buy live? And please don't tell me that if there wasn't a rental market there would be more homes for others to buy, because that simply is not how the market works.
There will always be people who need to rent.

NellG

Let me know when and I'll join you - pitchfork in hand.

M0nica

I hope you are right and I am wrong. We shall see.

I lived in Cornwall over 50 years ago and even then a lot of the cottages were holiday cottages, so it isn’t a new phenomenon. And most young people then couldn’t wait to leave Cornwall when they were old enough. It was us city people that were desperate to live there.

The example of one person who has had no contact with others and goes to a second home in the middle of nowhere, doesn’t really have relevance (except to that one person) in terms of the current restrictions, because it applies to very, very few.

Most second homes are in communities and travel between them involves the mixing of communities and the spread of the virus. As I said previously there are over half a million people who register more than one address which is potentially a large amount of traffic on the roads and within communities.

Leaving aside the virus, the “right” of an individual to own two dwellings often impacts on the rights of those in the “holiday home” community to family life, shelter and work. Before these places became “second home’ locations they were villages and towns where people carried out ordinary lives, bought homes, raised families, used shops, worked, supported each other. That has been denied them.

This is what I mean by one persons rights denying those of others.

GrannyRose15 and list can be extended to any length to any extreme. This used to be the argument of teetotallers -' 1 drink can lead to a life of alcoholism' or antigambling' buy one raffle ticket and you are doomed to a life of fiancial ruin and prison.

I see absolutely reason why COVID restrictions should end up as you prophecise. You haven't addressed where sendng people to prison or issuing restriction orders or even forcing people into mental homes could lead to. I mean to say, look what that kind of oppression has led to in China and Russia!

GrannyRose - I'll wait until all the vaccines have been given and it is safe to protest, if I then need to protest at all. As it stands the restrictions are necessary and just. The world does not revolve around me and my 'rights'. Before rights come responsibilities and for now I'd prefer to focus on my responsibilities as a member of society because that is the correct and moral thing to do.

If, after the virus becomes manageable, my rights and the rights of others are being eroded unnecessarily I will be the first to grab my pitchfork and flaming torch and go after the usurpers.

You are making many assumptions in that statement.

I wonder how someone who hasn't got the virus because she has not been in contact with anyone for at least a month can spread the virus by going to her second home (which is in the middle of nowhere) and staying there for a couple of nights before returning to her original place of residence.

But that isn't my main point.

I wonder at what stage you would consider that your rights have been breached unjustifiably.

When you are stopped from enjoying your own property?
When that property is taken away from you?
When all property is put into collective ownership so no-one owns anything?
When you are prevented from seeing your family because there is a national emergency?
When you are prevented from seeing your family - full stop?
When you are told you must work from home?
When you are told that you can't work at all?
When you are told you can't worship in a church?
When you are told you can't worship?

At what point do you start to protest? I am protesting now in the hope that our rights are not eroded further.

Will the rest of you protest at all, or will you wait until it is too late?

GrannyRose15, but these rights have always been conditional. The conditions are that one person is not infringing on anothers rights.

Everyday courts issue restraining orders stopping people going places where they have caused other people trouble. They are excluded from large areas around family homes, workplaces. Criminals are sent to prison, Some mentally ill people are restarined from leaving hospital.

The lockdown that stops people travelling is really no different. One person's right to travel to a second home could spread a pandemic infection to may be hundreds of others.

Varian we d not spend all our holidays in our second home, nor do most second home owners. .

For reasons, completely unrelated to having a second home, we avoid flying and I feel uncomfortable being a tourist in a poor country where tourism is akin to treating its inhabitants as if they and their poverty were part of a zoo, to be remarked on and exclaimed over.

In the last 10 years we have visited Ireland, Norway, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium, France, Spain and Switzerland.

Peasblossom

I just thought it would be interesting to discuss following Nannaroses vociferous declaration of rights. How one persons “right to” can impact on and actually deny another’s rights.

However, Nannarose hasn’t come back so it’s a bit of a dead duck.

Certainly didn’t mean it to get personal. Just exercising my brain - what’s left of it?

As I said in my post the rights I mentioned are enshrined in the universal declaration of human rights. So at some time very many important and esteemed people got together and thought that these were a "good thing".

They are not conditional upon the circumstances we find ourselves in. They are a "good thing".

My worry is that if they can be suspended for one reason then they can be suspended for any other and that way we all lose.

varian

Why does any one ever need more than one home?

I find it quite enough looking after the one home I have.

varian
My last paragraph was in reply to you. Sorry, I couldn't find your comment again when I looked for it.

JaneJudge

Human rights are extremely important but I've not ever heard it applied to justify enjoyment of second homes during pandemic.

Well you have now.

There are all sorts of reasons why I am upset and sometimes I come across as dogmatic and unreasonable. But I hope that some people will see through my tirade to the important point I am making.

In everything we do we employ a cost/ benefit analysis. How much is this going to cost, and how much good will come because of it. We do it naturally and usually don't have to think about what we are doing because it is so obviously the thing to do. It is this analysis that has not been done with the government's response to Covid. I am trying in my own way to balance the argument.

Many people have suffered financially and emotionally from the government's response. I find it hard to accept that so many on this site feel that what other people have lost is a price worth paying.

And to the poster who can't understand second home ownership please remember it is not always a choice to have a second home. Sometimes it comes about because you have to move house and can't sell the old one, and sometimes it comes about because someone has died and left you a property. In such cases it can take years to sort out.

It’s actually worked the other way with me. I was desperate to travel but I’ve been happy to watch travel programmes and relive holidays abroad in my head. And the grandchildren love having ‘their’’ room. As soon as they get here they’re straight off to the dunes to sledge down them. And when it’s been permissible they’ve stayed in the house and I’ve felt happy knowing exactly where they are even though I’m not with them. Also our dogs feel at home, too. I know what you mean though. There’s something wonderful about discovering a new place.

Varian It's great to go to different places on holiday however, if you have a second home, you can leave everything you need there and when you want to visit you can just jump in the car and go. You can go on spec without having to book a holiday in advance. You know where the best baker is and which butcher to avoid, etc etc. It's comfortable . That's why I think people like second homes. Others may disagree.

It seems a shame to spend all your holidays in your second home when there is a whole big world out there to discover. I think the last year will make us even more appreciative of travel to new places in the future.

MOnica my time and energy this week has been exercised by a leaking conservatory. That’s the sort of thing I don’t like to spend my time and energy on. Thank heavens I haven’t got 2?
I am lucky in that I live in a lovely area in a nice roomy house with pretty low pollution. I guess we have a second home in a way, in NSW so we can have the sun in the winter but my DD gets to look after the house we stay in. Best of both worlds, well it was!

Varian Go up thread and you will find a long post from me saying why we have our second home.

As for time and energy (*PamelaJ1*) We enjoy spending our time visiting our home and going out and about. Everyone has different interests, some people spend a lot of time playing golf or following football, or just sitting in front of a television. We enjoy being in France, travelling around. It is the base for holidays elsewhere in that country.

As for energy, I am the original Duracell bunny. I am on the go most of the day, whether home or away. It is surprisingly easy to look after a house in an area with clean air which you visit intermittently and which is not full of the clutter thatwe fill our main or only homes with.

DH’s mother bought a seaside property when her husband died suddenly just before he was due to retire. She spent many happy years going there for holidays taking her friends with her and becoming part of the local community. She didn’t want to live there permanently because her children and then grandchildren lived near to her permanent home. As she got older she travelled there less and less and DH (this was before I knew him) lived there and commuted to work. All of his family have had holidays there: my daughter even got married there. Now my grandchildren holiday there at least once a year. I’ve always wanted to either live by the sea or in the depths of the countryside but don’t want to live hundreds of miles away from my children. We live quite frugally, our pleasures are simple and we don’t travel abroad much. We know that house prices in the area are too expensive for many local people but at the same time many of the properties are owned by just a couple of large landowners and they rent them out: they are never up for sale. I think there are many reasons why people have second homes. They certainly aren’t money spinners. And quite often the people who own them have a deep love for the area.

varian something I can agree with you on. I have decided that everything you own requires time, energy and often money. Why bother.

Lillie

Or maybe even a beauty treatments' room!

Well that’s what I have in my house!
It’s empty now, someone could live in it but I might be back in business any minute.

Why does any one ever need more than one home?

I find it quite enough looking after the one home I have.