Twenty nine residents who were left stranded when the Manx border closed have returned to the island.

The group, the first to be repatriated since the lockdown came in last month, arrived on the Manannan fast craft yesterday afternoon.

They were taken under police escort to the Comis Hotel in Santon, where they will spend the next 14 days in quarantine in secure accommodation.

Each will have to pay a means-tested contribution, capped at £1,000, towards the cost of transport, accommodation and three meals a day during their time in quarantine.

The returning residents were collected at Manchester where they were subject to a simple health assessment and then taken by two coaches to Heysham.

Health Minister David Ashford said a temperature check was carried out to show whether or not someone has a fever, which is one of the symptoms of Covid-19.

He said it was ’certainly not an encompassing medical check’ but it would mean they would be fit to travel.

Initially the plan was to take them home on the Ben-my-Chree which, unlike the Manannan, has cabins.

Steps were taken to ensure everybody social distances on the fast craft.

It can carry up to 500 passengers so there was plenty of space to do that, said interim DHSC chief executive Kathryn Magson.

Mr Ashford said returning residents were not required to pay the £1,000 for the Comis accommodation upfront but could pay it over a ’substantial period of time’.

He told Tynwald if they vary from the advice of the clinicians, including on mandatory quarantine for returning residents, the ’repercussions for our community will be catastrophic’.

Mr Ashford said he could not confirm or deny whether a member of staff at Comis has tested positive for coronavirus.

But he added: ’What I can say is that the Comis is deep-cleaned before anybody goes into it and there are full infection control standards in place for that hotel to be used as a quarantine centre.’

He insisted that the quarantine measures were not against human rights.