EVERY coronavirus fixed penalty notice issued by police in Craven over the last seven days has been to visitors from outside of the area.

North Yorkshire Police issued 191 notices since February 16 and of those, eight were issued in Craven. All were visitors, six men and two women; seven were in breach of being 'outside their place of living' and one notice was handed for an indoor gathering.

Since the start of the third national coronavirus lockdown on January 5, police in North Yorkshire have issued  1,017 fixed penalties. 95 have been issued in Craven, including three to residents and 92 to visitors.

Chief Inspector Charlotte Bloxham, deputy lead for the force’s Covid-19 response said current lockdown rules remained in place and people should continue to stick to the rules.

“As we expected, half term proved to be the busiest week we have experienced so far in enforcement terms, with 191 FPNs being issued across the seven days. Over half of the tickets issued were to visitors to the county and the majority for being outdoors without a reasonable excuse," she said.

“Earlier this week we heard from the Prime Minister on the Government’s road map for leaving lockdown. I know we’re all eagerly awaiting life to return to normal and being reunited with our loved ones, but the Prime Minister did make one thing clear, the path out of lockdown was going to be led by data and not dates.

"The four steps he outlined to June 21 would only be taken if certain criteria were met – one of which was around the NHS being able to cope with the level of demand placed up on it and another the risk associated with new emerging variants of the virus.

“So, it’s really important that we don’t get too far ahead of ourselves and through irresponsible actions, jeopardise the progress we have made and need to keep making, to enable us all to move forward."

Chief Insp Bloxham added: “Until the Government indicates that it is safe to move to the next stage of the road map on March 29, the current lockdown rules and regulations will stay in place and North Yorkshire Police will continue to police them. We will take the necessary enforcement action required to protect the green shoots of recovery we are starting to see and to protect all our chances of getting out of lockdown.

“So I would ask the public to keep going. We are on the right path and we are doing the right things, but we must remain vigilant to the threat of the virus. Covid-19 has not gone away, please carry on sticking to the rules, so we can continue to move towards better times ahead.”