Airlines start the week on the back foot after UK’s green list for international

easyJet PLC (), British Airways owner SA () and  PLC () dipped in the red on Monday after the UK announced an underwhelming green list of countries deemed safe for travel.

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps confirmed on Friday that leisure travel from England will no longer be illegal from 17 May.

READ: British Airways owner IAG wants to see green list before scheduling more flights

However, different levels of restriction will be applied to individuals returning from countries based on the traffic light system.

Only people travelling from Portugal including the Azores and Madeira, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Brunei, , Faroe Islands, Gibraltar, Falkland Islands and Israel and Jerusalem won’t have to quarantine for ten days, though they will have to present a negative COVID-19 test.

The lists will be reviewed every three weeks, the government will also be publishing a ‘green watchlist’ to understand when a country may be changing denomination.

This will be based on the level of infection rates, the vaccine rollout and capabilities to identify new virus variants.

“Expectations were for a short list, but it contained only one mass market tourist destination… It contains an almost comical number of small territories and islands with few or no direct flights from the UK. This includes two with no airports and three more that had no regular scheduled commercial airline service at all pre-pandemic,” analysts at Liberum commented.

“Of more importance is what happens in subsequent reviews of the list. The industry’s hope is that additional meaningful destinations make it onto the list in time for the peak season on July and August. However, the extremely cautious approach so far does not bode well.”

easyJet dipped 3% to 1,063.64p, while IAG and Wizz Air were down 2% to 209p and 4,916p respectively.