NICOLA Sturgeon has said she won't rule out shutting Scotland's border with England to stop the spread of Covid.

Speaking at the briefing in Edinburgh, the First Minister said she would prefer a four nation solution.

The question came from Peter MacMahon from ITV Border who asked what happens if progress on closing the quarantine loophole is not made.

She said: "I don't rule it out. I would like to have the most effective system in place here so I'm not sure it is the best solution to have if it's the only one I can put into place then it may come to that but why let somebody travel halfway across the UK before you do that?

"It would be better if we had that four nations approach, or at least a three nations approach, where the border of the island that Scotland, England and Wales share had the same provisions in place."

The FM went on: "Now, I'm trying to be constructive here. I often get criticised- sometimes fairly and sometimes unfairly - for being criticial of the UK Government but I just want us to come to the best solution possible.

"If you listen to any public health expert right now they say not just for Scotland but for the whole of the UK, this is one of the biggest risks we face so why leave these loopholes? Why be in a position where we are discussing second best solutions when we can talk to each other to come up with the best solution."

READ MORE: Scottish ministers look at border controls to stop Covid quarantine loophole

People flying directly in to Scotland on international flights have to self-isolate for 10 days in a quarantine hotel, under new regulations which took effect on Monday.

Unless exempt, a passenger has to pay £1,750 to quarantine in a room at one of six designated hotels in a bid to avoid importation of the virus.

However, Transport Secretary Michael Matheson said on Sunday that a “loophole” allowing overseas travellers to avoid hotel quarantine still exists which could “potentially undermine the public health approach here in Scotland”.

In England, the UK Government will only require hotel quarantine for visitors from a “red list” of 33 countries designated as high risk, meaning travellers arriving from elsewhere could avoid it by entering Scotland via England.

Visitors would still have to self-isolate for the 10-day period, but would not have to do so at one of the designated hotels due to a lack of agreement between the Scottish and Westminster Governments.

The first international flight subject to the new rules arrived in Scotland from Istanbul, Turkey, on Monday morning.

It had been due to carry around 65 passengers but fewer than five made it on board, due to issues at departures.

Sturgeon added: "I'm not standing here criticising one government over another. We all have a duty to take the decisions we think are appropriate. One of the significant risks we face in the next few weeks is importation.

"We know that it happened as we came out of lockdown last summer – we suppressed the virus to very very low levels here but it was reseeded from travel. That's a risk again but actually it is probably a bigger risk now because the virus has mutated so it's not just the virus that we risk bringing into the country, it's new variants of the virus.

"We know from the last couple of months they can really throw us off course quite considerably so I think we've got to protect against that to the best of our ability. The problem with just imposing quarantine in a managed way on people coming from high risk countries is that we don't know new variants are only in high risk countries."

She went on: "Not all countries do very much genomic sequencing so it's possible that some countries we don't deem right now as high risk also have new variants that are already circulating so unless we impose managed isolation in a comprehensive way, we risk letting the virus come in. Clearly, we can only do that directly for people coming directly into Scotland."

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock said on Monday that he is happy to discuss the matter with the Scottish Government.

The FM went on to say that she raised the issue with Michael Gove during their four nations discussions and that Transport Secretary Michael Matheson and Health Secretary Jeane Freeman have also raised it.

"I heard a clip of Matt Hancock on the radio this morning saying he was willing to continue to talk to us about this so I welcome that and hopefully we can get some progress in the days to come," she added.

Six hotels have been block-booked in Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow, with up to 1300 rooms available.

Scottish Government guidance stipulates that those subject to quarantine require a negative Covid-19 test no more than three days before travelling and to have booked at a room at a quarantine hotel in advance.

They will also have to submit a passenger locator form to the Home Office, declaring which countries they have been to in the 10 days before arrival in the UK.

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Airlines have been asked to check for these and they will also be checked on arrival by Border Force officers, who can issue fines of £480 for non-compliance.

Security officers will then escort passengers to baggage reclaim and to pre-arranged transport to their quarantine hotel.

On arrival at the hotel, they will be given two home testing kits to be used on days two and eight of isolation.

These are covered by the cost, as are three meals per day, fruit and soft drinks.

If they test positive at any point they will be required to stay in the hotel for 10 days after the test, at an additional charge starting from £152 daily for the first adult.