Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I have an issue with the Labour Party approach and the zero Covid strategy that will kill the entire domestic economy, as Deputy Mattie McGrath has just said. I look at small businesses such as barber shops, bars, hairdressers, nail salons and sit-in cafés. Lockdowns are putting these businesses under severe pressure. They are not sure if they will be able to reopen or what the circumstance will be going forward.

The mental health implications of lockdowns are severe. They are impacting on suicide rates and causing drug and alcohol abuse, which needlessly cause lives to be lost.

The isolation and lack of social isolation does not stop the spread of the disease but it does destroy the economy.

My colleagues in the Rural Independent Group and I have been calling for over ten months for our focus to be on all incoming passengers. As early as last April or May, I called for mandatory testing of and quarantine for all incoming passengers and it was never put in place. Now we are frantically trying to do that and it is a bit late. Latest data indicate that 70% of all Covid cases in Ireland are from the UK variant. This means that 70% of all current cases emerged from the variant coming into the country via someone who travelled here. The Government has completely failed to implement strict inward travel protocols here. This now means higher case number and harsher lockdowns.

We should be focusing on the nurse registration fee of €100 with which they are being hit-----

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