Dáil debates

Thursday, 9 December 2021

Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions

Covid-19 Pandemic

10:50 am

Photo of Leo VaradkarLeo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

In fairness, anybody who takes part in these engagements will say that there are very valuable. We do them in different ways. There is the hospitality and tourism forum, which is co-chaired by me and the Minister, Deputy Martin. It very much engages with the representative bodies in that sector and there are many of them. Unions are also represented there, as they should be. The Minister of State, Deputy English, chairs the retail forum which is probably less significant in pandemic terms at the moment but was a very big deal when retail was restricted with issues around supply chains. There is then the labour employer economic forum, LEEF, which has sectoral groups with different unions represented on it through ICTU, which is led by the Taoiseach but I also have a role in that.

Ventilation is covered under the work safety protocol but at the moment no business gets any kind of additional benefit for having good ventilation and that is down to an absence of adequate evidence but there probably should be. That is something that I have an open mind on and if it is the case that the evidence stacks up and we could allow higher capacities in well-ventilated businesses, that would make sense to me.

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