Updated: 10.20am
Representatives from the hospitality sector are to be warned that compliance with Covid-19 guidelines must improve in response to the latest surge in case numbers.
A meeting will take place between the Government and representative groups on Tuesday following seven days of daily case numbers being in excess of 3,000.
The Government will seek "maximum compliance" with existing guidelines from pubs, restaurants and live entertainment venues, particularly the checking of Covid certificates, according to The Irish Times.
Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Michael McGrath has said businesses in the hospitality industry who do not comply with Covid-19 measures do not deserve to remain open.
Speaking to RTÉ on his way into this morning’s Cabinet meeting, Mr McGrath said: “Overall there’s been a pretty good level of compliance, but we can do better, any outlets that are not complying with the rules are putting everyone at risk.
“I think the public will increasingly vote with their feet, and leave the premises if they’re not satisfied.
“We expect the minority who are not compliant – to comply with the rules, it’s in all of our interests that they do, if they don’t then there are penalties, the Government will act, the authorities will act and certainly any premises that is not complying with the rules does not deserve to remain open.”
Recent research by the Economic and Social Research Institute revealed the number of customers not being asked to present a Covid cert has increased steadily in recent weeks, jumping from 21 to 37 per cent in pubs, while 34 per cent said they were not asked for the certificate at a restaurant in October.
Covid restrictions eased on October 22nd, allowing for the reopening of nightclubs and live music events with a number of additional measures in place.
Since then, 2,266 compliance checks have been carried out by the HSE, "at all times of the day/night and at weekends". These checks found 70 per cent of businesses to be "compliant", 23 per cent "required additional compliance measures" and 7 per cent were "non-compliant".
Failure to comply with the guidelines can result in a €2,500 fine for the business, in addition to a referral being made to Gardaí, which could result in an objection to the renewal of the premises' licence.
Closure
Ahead of the meeting, the chief executive of the Restaurants Association of Ireland (RAI), Adrian Cummins said he will be calling on officials to seek out and shut down premises that are not complying with public health measures.
“We want to know who they are, where they are and when they will be shut down,” he told RTÉ Radio’s Morning Ireland.
Mr Cummins said his association had been calling for the public measures to be strictly enforced and if there were businesses that flouted the measures then they should be shut down.
“Inspectors must go in and shut them down,” he said. “They are putting other businesses at risk...This is a critical time for the nation.”
The RAI has issued many communications with its members, he said, “to make sure we do this right and proper”.
The public had already stepped up to the plate with the high levels of vaccination, but the association wanted to know at what stage would there be full protection, he added. “If 100 per cent of the population is fully vaccinated, do you now have full protection? We would like that question answered.”
Through the pandemic the hospitality sector frequently had to wait a long time for answers from Government and public health officials, he said, adding that today he would be seeking answers from the inspection authority.
“We need to know where that 7 per cent [of non-compliant businesses] are, who they are and to make sure they are shut down.”
Mr Cummins said he is yet to find the name of a business which had to be shut down.
Additional reporting by Vivienne Clarke
