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The new system is seen as a vital precondition for lifting the lockdown and preventing a second infectious wave of the deadly virus. It was rolled out in England on Thursday, as Boris Johnson seeks to bring restrictions to a speedy end and get the country back on its feet again. People are being asked to voluntarily comply with instructions to go into quarantine, should they be contacted by NHS tracers.

The Health Secretary Matt Hancock implored the public to abide by the new rules as he gave further details about the scheme on Wednesday during the daily coronavirus briefing from Downing Street.

He said: “It is your civic duty, so you avoid unknowingly spreading the virus and you help to break the chain of transmission.”

However in a major blow to government hopes, a report shown to the Scientific Advisory Group on Emergencies (SAGE) in April said that “only around 50 percent” of people abided by the rule to self-isolate when they developed a cough or fever.

The document called for “rapid” research on how best to get people to comply with self-isolation.

Health experts also considered another report which warned of “major behavioural barriers” to people using the NHS contact-tracing app, which is currently being trialled on the Isle of Wight.

The Government has hired 25,000 contact tracers, who will work with around 5,000 clinicians and the 20,000 people already working in the coronavirus testing programme to run the system.

It will rely on people following the rules and informing the NHS when they have symptoms, and those who have been around them sticking to the strict 14-day quarantine period.

Initially it will be launched without any fines or penalties in place for not complying, but Mr Hancock does have the power to impose them if the public does not abide by the rules.

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Mr Johnson said: “This is something where we’re relying on people’s public spiritedness, on their willingness to cooperate and defeat the disease.”

He said in other areas, such as tracing HIV infections, the system does work, and therefore he is “confident” it will for Covid-19 too.

But the PM added “of course we would keep sanctions on the table”.

Behavioural scientists have expressed concern that the Dominic Cummings affair may have undermined the government’s ability to persuade people  to comply with the new rules.

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Mr Cummings is accused of breaking lockdown rules he helped draft to drive his family 260 miles to his family home in Durham in late March.

The prime minister’s top adviser was roundly criticised for his actions, but insists he “acted legally”.

Susan Michie, a health psychologist at University College London, said the incident had damaged the sense of collective solidarity so vital in maintaining public trust and compliance.

“The actions of Cummings, and of Johnson and other cabinet ministers subsequently, have been perceived by the UK public to show that there is one rule for those close to the government and another for the rest of us – i.e., a lack of fairness and equity,” she said.

“This is extremely damaging, as collective solidarity is very important for maintaining trust.”

Ms Michie has been a member of the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Behaviours (SPI-B).

In February, a SPI-B report stressed that a “sense of collectivism” would be important for maintaining public order.

Trust and respect are also important, said Stephen Reicher, a behavioural scientist at the University of St Andrews, UK, who has also been a member of SPI-B.

“The literature on why people obey authority shows very clearly that a critical factor is the sense that one is trusted, respected and listened to by authority,” he argued.

Adherence to restrictions is “critically undermined when this is replaced by a sense of ‘us’ and ‘them’ – one law for us, another for them”.

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