With B.C. officially into Phase 3 of its COVID-19 restart plan, it means people from other Canadian provinces and territories will be able to travel to British Columbia this summer.

During his weekly media briefing, Premier John Horgan says there never was a plan to restrict out-of-province visitors from entering B.C., noting it was always a suggestion that people avoid non-essential travel over the past few months.

“Now that we are moving into Phase 3, our message to them would be slightly amended to say, ‘certainly if you are coming to British Columbia, be mindful of what British Columbians have done together to get us to a position where we can welcome people from other parts of the country,'” he said.

Horgan adds though the focus is to make sure that British Columbians can travel freely within their own province, while following all existing public health measures that have been in place for months.

“There are many border towns with Alberta and indeed the Yukon is opening up to British Columbia,” Horgan said. “The Premier of Yukon and I have been working closely to make sure that those connections can be intact during this period.”

“To all those Albertans who have properties in British Columbia and spend much of their time in British Columbia, I’m certain that they’ll be coming for the summer and we welcome them. We hope that they’ll abide by the guidance of their neighbours on how to act and comport themselves while they are here for their safety and the safety of British Columbians.”

Horgan is hoping that people from across Canada will visit B.C. once restrictions are eased, in the hopes of making up for the lack of international tourists because of restrictions that remain in place.

Earlier this week, Dr. Henry noted that B.C. residents have been maintaining contact rates at about 65 per cent, which is what health officials were aiming for with the gradual easing restrictions. Travellers in B.C. are being told to have a plan in place and to be mindful of who they come into contact with, which will help with contact tracing should someone fall ill.

“We want people to have their travel manners on when they come here to make sure that they are doing what we’ve been doing so that we can all stay safe in our communities here in B.C. and when people are going back and forth to their communities and other provinces in Canada,” Henry said.

She echoed the Premier’s commenting to say she doesn’t see B.C. having to put in restrictions on travel in the months ahead.

“We have lots of reasons why people go back and forth particularly to Alberta and the Yukon,” noted Henry. “We have across the country worked together to manage this pandemic, though each of us has experienced something slightly different.”

“If somebody is exposed and they come back to British Columbia, then they’ll need to stay in quarantine for 14 days and we’ll support them in doing that, but that’s very important so that we don’t we don’t have a lot of reintroduction into our very fragile balance that we have here in B.C. that is working for us.”

Some B.C. First Nations though want to restrict visitors as they say the province needs to take more action to protect health in their communities. Horgan acknowledged those concerns, saying the province is working to get more information.

He said the ministers of Indigenous relations, public safety and health would provide that information so B.C. can be as transparent as possible be with those communities.