“Government must opt for re-opening to avoid deep and lasting harm,” Carol Nolan TD

“We will never hit zero-Covid. But we have reached zero-common sense.” Carol Nolan TD

“People need to live again. They need hope and not the ongoing imposition of the autocratic, fanatical tunnel vision of Nphet,” Deputy Nolan.

Independent TD for Laois Offaly has said she is calling on Government to proceed with the full re-opening of indoor dining for restaurants, cafes, and public houses as well as summer camps for children. Deputy Nolan was speaking after the National Public Health Emergency Team is reported to have recommended a delay of “several weeks” to the scheduled re-opening plans:

“I think there will be thousands of businesses and tens of thousands of workers waking up this morning in rural and urban Ireland in absolute frustration and indeed despair at the continuing insistence of Nphet that we adopt of this kind hyper risk-averse approach.

Restaurateurs , publicans, coffee shop owners and those who are trying to keep their towns and villages from utter ruin will be devastated if the planned for re-opening does not go ahead.

People’s patience has simply run out.

Employers are exhausted and they are broken, financially and emotionally by the constant and apparently never-ending dominance of public health advice to the exclusion of all other considerations.

We will never hit zero-Covid. But we have reached zero-common sense.

We know that the Delta variant poses a risk. But we also know that Ireland is unique in all Europe in terms of the scale and level of restrictions that have imposed. That absolutely must end.

People need to live again. They need hope and not the ongoing imposition of the autocratic, fanatical tunnel vision of NPHET for whom no amount of even the most prudent risk seems to be acceptable,” concluded Deputy Nolan.