Mr. John Dolan:

“The creep” was a lovely expression. Let us go back and look at it. This happened in an emergency situation and it was an emergency response. On the one hand, there were people wanting to get out and about in safe way, with outside being that safe way, and there were retailers that needed to be operating again and turning a few bob. The Chair put his finger on it – that is the public realm. Outside one’s business is not the private realm.

A number of us have been involved in the Make Way Day over the years. Before the pandemic, there were enough issues with rubbish on footpaths, people parking on footpaths, all sorts of advertising obstacles, sandwich boards and all sorts of things. Even apart from those, there will often be issues with the standard of the surfaces and footpaths and whatever. That problem was there before Covid. It is now there in spades with what we are describing here.

On the other hand, who wants to be a killjoy? It is great to see people out. However, we have to sort of move it back a bit now and start to redesign it. That is basically in a word what Ms Carthy said. It is necessary and we need more public realm. It is great to see accessible and inclusive playgrounds, green spaces and all of these things. While that is happening on the one hand, the shop floor is moving out into the street. That is just not on. It has to be calmed down and there has to be the possibility for people with disabilities to move around and have parking bays. People who have vision impairments or other issues also need to be taken into account.