Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 9 September 2020
Special Committee on Covid-19 Response
Covid-19: Legislative Framework Underpinning the State's Response
Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source
It is an ongoing communications challenge.
The committee heard evidence from behavioural scientists and other public health experts. One of the scientific experts questioned the common sense behind the requirement for a €9 meal and how it protects the public, as have many other people, but the behavioural scientists from another university responded that when a person is engaged in eating a meal in that way, his or her behaviour changes and he or she is less likely to interact and so on. The nuance of all of the communications is easy to miss at every level. That is certainly the case in the House and among scientists as well as at every other level. Dr. Kenny referred to things being possibly delivered, but the Law Society is not suggesting that it was a deliberate strategy on the part of the Government.