Coronavirus: Irish pubs and restaurants to resume indoor service

Irish pubs and restaurants to resume indoor service

Indoor hospitality in the Republic of Ireland will return later on Monday.

Customers, including those from Northern Ireland, must have official proof they have been fully vaccinated or have recovered from Covid-19 within the last 180 days.

Many pubs, especially those that do not serve food, have been closed since March 2020.

As the industry gets ready for reopening, customers have been reminded of the new guidelines.

For the overwhelming majority of people in the Republic, they will prove eligibility through the EU's Digital Covid Cert with its QR codes.

Every adult must also bring along official identification such as a driving licence with a photo.

The president of the Restaurant Association of Ireland, Mark McGowan, said it was his understanding that the Northern Ireland vaccination card will be accepted as proof of immunity at venues in the Republic.

"Once valid proof of immunity is shown at the door along with photographic evidence, that will be sufficient. It has to be an official id and official vaccination cert. We want tourists from the north coming down".

The lead person at a table or a solo customer will be asked to give his or her name for contact-tracing purposes.

Once inside, there will be a limit of six adults per table, no bar service and, customers can only remove their masks once seated.

Children will be allowed indoors and premises must close by 23:30.

Not all pubs and restaurants will reopen.

Some owners have complained that they have not been given enough time to hire and train staff to comply with the new guidelines.

County Donegal publican Kevin Kavanagh is among those who say the guidance from government has come too late for him to start serving indoors again on Monday.

"I am not fully vaccinated myself, my sister and a few other staff are not fully vaccinated, so we just cannot take the chance," he told BBC Radio Foyle.

'Make it work'

"Early Saturday morning, about 1 o'clock I got an email with the guidelines set out. It is more or less impossible for us to open. Our government, I think have let us down again".

The last year has been "extremely tough and very frustrating" for Ireland's hospitality sector, he added.

Letterkenny restaurateur Carol Meenan said it was an "exciting day". She said she hopes customers will be patient as staff come to terms with the new regulations.

Verifying identification and proof of vaccination "will be a full-time job at the door", she said.

"We are going to have a lot of logistics to get through and it might be a bit of a slow time coming through the door. But we are so happy to get open and get a little bit of normality back", she said.

Padraig Cribben, chief executive of the Vintners' Federation of Ireland said " a lot of challenges lie ahead" for the sector.

"It is certainly a day of relief for many businesses that haven't operated for almost 500 days, since March of last year. But it is relief mixed with a certain element of anxiety, anxiety around how customers are going to react".

'Significant day'

Mr McGowan, from the Restaurants Association of Ireland, said it was a "very significant day for hospitality across the country", adding that the "biggest issue" for business owners was staffing levels.

He also said the new guidelines were published at "the 11th hour" and "it is too short notice".

The chief executive of the Health Service Executive (HSE), Paul Reid, urged people in a tweet to safely embrace the reopening and "make it work".

He also said 83% of adults were partially vaccinated and over 68% fully vaccinated.

For most people the return of indoor hospitality is a welcome development, a sunny glimmer of hope in the slow return to what was once normality.