You must not leave or be outside of your home except where you have a ‘reasonable excuse’. This is the law. The police can take action against you if you leave home without a ‘reasonable excuse’, and issue you with a fine (Fixed Penalty Notice).
You can be given a Fixed Penalty Notice of £200 for the first offence, doubling for further offences up to a maximum of £6,400.
A ‘reasonable excuse’ includes:
Work
You can only leave home for work purposes where it is unreasonable for you to do your job from home. This includes, but is not limited to, people who work within critical national infrastructure, construction or manufacturing that require in-person attendance
Volunteering
You can also leave home to provide
voluntary or charitable services. You must volunteer from home unless it is not reasonably possible for you to do so.
Essential activities
You can leave home to buy things at shops or obtain services where necessary. You may also leave your home to do these things on behalf of a disabled or vulnerable person or someone self-isolating.
Education and childcare
You can only leave home for education, registered childcare, and supervised activities for children where the child is eligible to attend. Access to education and children’s activities for school-aged pupils is restricted. See
further information on education and childcare. You can continue existing arrangements for contact between parents and children where they live apart. If you live in a household with anyone aged under 14, you can also
form a childcare bubble.
Meeting others and care
You can leave home:
- to visit people in your support bubble ( if you are legally permitted to form one)
- to provide informal childcare for children under 14 as part of a childcare bubble (for example, to enable parents to work, not to enable social contact between adults)
- to provide care for disabled or vulnerable people
- to provide emergency assistance
- to attend a support group (of up to 15 people)
- for respite care where that care is being provided to a vulnerable person or a person with a disability, or is a short break in respect of a looked-after child.
Exercise
You can continue to exercise alone, with one other person or with your household or support bubble. This should be limited to once per day, and you should not travel outside your local area.You should maintain
social distancing. See
the exercising section of this guidance.
Medical reasons
You can leave home for a medical reason, including to get a COVID-19 test, for medical appointments and for emergencies.
Maternity
You can leave home to be with someone who is giving birth or, accessing other maternity services, or to be with a baby receiving neonatal critical care. There is
NHS guidance on pregnancy and coronavirus.
Harm
You may leave home, to avoid injury or illness or to escape risk of harm (such as domestic abuse).
Compassionate visits
You may also leave home to visit someone who is dying or someone in a care home (if permitted under
care home guidance), hospice, or hospital, or to accompany them to a medical appointment.
Animal welfare reasons
You can leave home for animal welfare reasons, such as to attend veterinary services for advice or treatment.
Communal worship and life events
You can leave home to attend or visit a place of worship for communal worship, to attend a funeral or event related to a death, to visit a burial ground or a remembrance garden, or to attend a wedding ceremony. You should follow the
guidance on the safe use of places of worship and must not mingle with anyone outside of your household or support bubble. Weddings, funerals and religious, belief-based or commemorative events linked to someone’s death are all subject to limits on the numbers that can attend.
Further reasonable excuses
There are further reasonable excuses. For example, you may leave home to fulfil legal obligations, or to carry out activities related to buying, selling, letting or renting a residential property, for the purpose of picketing, or where it is reasonably necessary for voting in an election or referendum. See guidance on
campaigning during the national lockdown. This applies to anyone campaigning for electoral events.