OUTRAGE OF PUBS AND PENSIONERS
Bars and restaurants must keep record of what customers eat ++ Staycation tax break excludes elderly and jobless
GOVERNMENT attempts to handle the Covid crisis are once again facing a barrage of criticisms – this time from the elderly, restaurant owners and even from its own ranks. A State-funded holiday break scheme, Stay and Spend, has been criticised for ignoring pensioners and those on low pay, while new bar and restaurant rules have been dismissed as ‘bureaucracy gone mad’.
The latest regulations for the hardpressed hospitality sector – demanding that records of the food we order be kept for as long as 28 days – have sparked such fury that restaurant chiefs are calling in the data protection watchdog.
And Fianna Fáil TD Marc MacSharry
pleaded with the Taoiseach to ‘urgently reverse this authoritarian and unnecessary nonsense’.
CEO of the Restaurants Association of Ireland Adrian Cummins said he has written to the Data Protection Commission to raise the issue, while Professor of Public Health Systems at DCU Anthony Staines told the Irish Daily Mail that he didn’t know of a public health reason for the rule, other than ‘to make sure restaurants who say they’re feeding people are actually feeding people’.
The Government also fell foul of pensioners, the jobless and low-paid workers yesterday when it decided to exclude many of them from a new staycation scheme.
The cash incentive to support the hospitality sector was branded a ‘disgrace’ last night as it will only benefit taxpayers. People Before Profit TD Bríd Smith asked if the poor should not benefit from such a State scheme. Denis Naughten TD said it ignores older people who do not have a tax liability and inland counties with limited numbers of Fáilte Ireland approved hotels and B&Bs.
Meanwhile, a prominent Dublin pub owner said the rules that compel them to keep customers’ food orders for 28 days, was ‘the nanny state gone mad’. And the Restaurant Association said it was ‘dreamed up by a Government mandarin sitting on his couch, who hasn’t a notion how bars and restaurants really operate’.
The Licensed Vintners’ Association (LVA), which represents Dublin pubs, demanded to know how storing details of a customer’s pizza toppings or how their potato was cooked is in any way going to stop the coronavirus.
The Vintners’ Federation of Ireland (VFI), which represents
‘If you didn’t laugh at this, you’d cry’
pubs outside Dublin, said the rule was ‘crazy stuff’ and ‘bureaucracy gone mad’. It said: ‘Why does the Government think this law will help in the fight against Covid? It’s madness.’
Health Minister Stephen Donnelly signed the 28-day regulation into law without consulting bar and restaurant owners. It means that a record of every item of food a customer orders will have to be stored for 28 days, to trace possible outbreaks of coronavirus, and to ensure food worth €9 to each customer is being served.
The two vintners groups and the Restaurant Association are now calling on an investigation by the Data Protection Commissioner.
Noel Anderson, Managing Director of The Bridge bar in Ballsbridge and the Lemon & Duke in Dublin city centre, said the regulation was so over-the-top that he was embarrassed for the Government.
‘It’s the nanny state gone mad, if you didn’t laugh at this, you would cry,’ he said.
The new rule is being introduced ahead of sweeping Garda powers, passed by the Dáil yesterday, that will allow gardaí to shut down bars and restaurants that fail to comply with coronavirus regulations.
The legislation was passed by 126 votes to 12 with Solidarity/People Before Profit, three rural and three other independents opposing it.
Mr Anderson said this was the fifth new regulation the Health Department has imposed since July. ‘It will mean employing additional resources at a time when bars can’t afford it.
‘There is a complete disconnection between the Department of Health and the bars and restaurants. The health guys are making these decisions without understanding the business world and there has been no consultation,’ he said.
The LVA said: ‘No thought has been put into the administration burden this is going to create. How is it going to help protect public health, knowing what topping was on a customer’s pizza or what way their potatoes were cooked? We think this is a complete overreach.’ He said the regulation was ‘dropped on unexpectedly and with no consultation.’ Restaurants Association chief Mr Cummins said many restaurants will have to invest €5,000 in computer technology to comply, at a time when they didn’t have the money because of the coronavirus lockdown. He said if the regulation is designed to catch rogue restaurants and bars that were ignoring the €9 food rule, that should be stated. ‘Instead we get a one line email without explanation. We have never had to contact the Data Commissioner but we will now,’ he said. Infectious disease ecologist at UCC Gerry Killeen told the Mail: ‘I suspect the idea of keeping the receipts is more to do with making sure that people are eating food. I hope that is not the issue and I hope there is something more sensible and epidemiological behind this.’
Prof. Killeen added that checking compliance with regulations should not be a matter for the gardaí but rather for environmental health personnel who can check on issues like this.
‘The gardaí were busy enough before this, but checking receipts in pubs is not their job,’ he said. ‘They don’t even check parking, there are other people to do that.’