Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy is asking me to speculate. It is a pretty reasonable question but not one I can answer. I do not know what others may have thought of the matter. All I can tell the Deputy is that the decision was taken for operational reasons to manage risk. I believe that it was absolutely the right decision and that the results of that are seen in how the HSE has responded with the vaccination programme, testing and tracing and everything else that has gone on over the past 18 months. Is it possible that people thought as the Deputy has suggested? I guess it is, yes. Maybe they did, but I do not recall anyone expressing such a view to me.