The Lemon Fool

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-52150388
I have a problem with this ...
'A day at the seaside or a week in your holiday home are NOT essential travel'

Thoughts ? Looks odd to me, that 'are'...

I agree, but I would dodge the issue by rearranging it 'It is NOT essential to travel for a day at the seaside or a week in your holiday home'.

Scott.

Or, more succinctly:

'A day at the seaside or a week in your holiday home are NOT considered to be essential travel'.

Or "do (or does) not count as essential travel". Even the red-top readers should be able to get the hang of that.

BJ

Actually I think it's the "or" that's the issue. It should be an "and" - "X and Y are Z". "X or Y are Z" doesn't sound right at all.

With the "and", though, it's not entirely clear what the negation applies to - does "X and Y are not Z" mean that "X is not Z, and Y is also not Z" or "X and Y together are not Z (but X or Y on their own may be)". It's similar to the issue with inclusive and exclusive "or" - does "You must do A or B" mean "choose only one" or "do at least one"?

I agree that re-wording the sentence is the best idea, but if you want to keep as close as possible to the original, "Neither a day at the seaside nor a week in your holiday home are essential travel". Of course you lose the emphasised "NOT" in this version.