Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Covid-19) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages
Seanad Éireann — 2020-03-27
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Martin Conway (FG), Administrative Panel

You are doing a remarkable job in your last day as Cathaoirleach in this session. You do not have to correct yourself often at all.
I suggest that the provision in Senator Horkan's amendment probably will not apply because most of these businesses will be non-essential and would probably be closed in any event. Therefore, what would be required in terms of obligations for opening times would be non-applicable.
Senator Craughwell made observations on non-essential businesses. I have to agree with him. I would not consider health food shops necessarily essential businesses. Some luxury food shops remain open. Again, I would not consider them to be essential businesses. There may be situations of confined spaces. These may be small specialist luxurious food outlets operating in a confined space. With the best will in the world I do not believe they would be able to adhere to social distancing requirements. We cannot dot all the "i's" and cross all the "t's" and there has to be some buy-in. I reckon 99.9% are absolutely buying in. I would encourage those who are not to do so.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2020-03-27/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:48:15+00:00
Sitting date: 2020-03-27