Richard Boyd Barrett Criticises Government's Confusing Travel Guidance

Taoiseach, it's one thing to have a lack of coordination and coherence about foreign travel and green lists before a cabinet meeting, but it is quite something else to have that lack of coherence and coordination after the cabinet meeting where presumably you discuss this. And you see, you're just not acknowledging that what Simon Coveney said today didn't clarify matters, it confused matters more. What he said was that the green list included countries whose infection rate was at the same level of Ireland's or below and, and I'm paraphrasing him but accurately, he said therefore it was as safe to go to those countries as it was to travel in Ireland. And then he goes on to say, but we think you shouldn't go there. But if you do go there, it's okay and you don't have to quarantine. Now, where is the coherence in that? And have you now become the experts on health advice? For him to say, for him to say, it is as safe to go to the green list countries as it is to travel here is first of all a signal for people to go. Why, if it's as safe, would you stop people from going? And why are Nefferts saying they shouldn't go? Presumably because they think it isn't safe to go. But your government spokesperson this morning said it's as safe to go as to travel in Ireland. Now, if that isn't a mess and a total lack of coherence and a total lack of coordination that leads to absolutely understandable confusion on the part of the public, I really do not know what is, Taoiseach. Thank you, Deputy. Taoiseach. First of all, in relation to Deputy Smith's questions, the reason for the cabinet delay yesterday was we had a cabinet subcommittee on the stimulus plan involving ministers, myself and the leader of the Green Party, with a whole host of officials in coming to the final stages of the preparation of what will be a very comprehensive stimulus plan to create jobs. So I wouldn't read anything into the fact that we had to put the meeting back because I'd come back from the Doyle yesterday as well in terms of the duties I had here in terms of questions and so on. So the timelines were tight and that explains that. Now, we did meet in advance of the cabinet, which we do, that's the whole idea of the, and it's a cabinet subcommittee. So in line with all cabinet subcommittees, I'm not in a position to reveal what happens at the meetings, but it goes through what's about to come up. And just in terms of the memo in relation to travel, I mean, that's been in preparation for quite some time. And the whole issue of international travel has been on the agenda now for about two months, more since the whole reopening started. And if you recall about two weeks ago, we put back the decision in relation to international travel till the 20th, that was yesterday or the day before yesterday. But because I got detained in Brussels for four days and that wasn't anticipated, we had to put everything back. And hence the meeting at eight o'clock last evening. I had thought I'd been to Dublin on Monday morning, but I wasn't. So there's no big mystery to the fact that we've had cabinet meetings and we had to have one at eight o'clock last night. There was no mystery to that. I just wasn't, I was in Brussels and I wasn't in the position to be here Monday. Luckily got back on Tuesday in time for the Dáil. And the memo itself would have been in preparation last week and over the weekend. I would have had discussions over the weekend with others in relation to it. And these issues were being debated with and discussed with relevant ministers. And we had a very good meeting last night of the cabinet on the issue, very good meeting. And it was constructive and matter of fact. And I would say that, again, I have to say, I think there's a, and I listened to Deputy Roy Barrett's comments in terms of, I think you're overstating it. I think there's a degree of hyperbole in what you're saying. The bottom line here is that these countries have a lower incidence than COVID-19, lower incidence of COVID-19 than people in Ireland has. People need to know that. And people know, I just said, people need to know that as information. There is a need to advise people of what the status is in countries. Other countries are in a much worse situation. Overall, we're saying, you know, the safest thing to do is to stay at home and, you know, have your holiday this year at Ireland. And that's, that's, that to me is fairly basic and fairly sensible. I would, I wouldn't, I mean, we're, we have a very restrictive travel regime at the moment in terms of our advice. Very, very restrictive. Travel is on the floor. Now the next stage is we will be getting a call centre in place, the electronic locator form. The contact tracing is key. There'll be randomised testing at airports. And we're exploring the issue of areas where there's a high incidence of COVID-19 to see how we can further protect our citizens from any potential dangers of people travelling from such locations in here. And how best to deal with that both legally and, and, and, and sensibly in terms of, of life itself. Because remember when people talk about travel from areas, and there's been some very tough stories as well, in terms of families who can't get back, you know, from, from, from, from countries. So travel isn't all about tourism. And even though in Europe, well, it's important because in Europe, for example, they've had various advisories, but they've never banned the plane from landing anywhere. Nor have we. And there's a reason for that, you know, in terms of both workers, in terms of family members who work. We have people in Ireland who work in Europe, for example, who may want to get home for two or three weeks. And, and they're, you know, they're working on behalf of the state. So what is the message to those workers? That they come back and, and they have to quarantine mandatarily? They'll have to restrict their movements if they're from countries that are outside that list. But we just need a bit of balance in our, in our debate about this. I gave figures earlier. Travel is on the floor compared to where it was a year ago. That doesn't take away the dangers of, of, of, of COVID-19 through travel. And I work with, and I talked to the chief medical officer, great respect, and I work with him on this. And we'll continue to do so. Government has to take a wider breadth of issues on board when it makes these decisions. You've Just a few.. . SPEAKER 1 .