Pubs won't sue over 'indoor snub', but want reopening date to save businesses 

Publicans' groups call for clarity on when indoor service can resume, warning the longer pubs are closed to indoor service, the more businesses will fail

Pubs want a date to reopen serving indoors.

Pubs are not planning to take the Government to court over reopening indoor drinking, but warn a full reopening date is "vital" for the survival of many businesses. 

The Vintners' Federation of Ireland (VFI) said the longer pubs are closed to indoor service, the more businesses will fail. 

As part of its proposed easing of restrictions, the Government last week effectively divided the hospitality sector – saying hotels could reopen indoor dining and drinking, to residents only, on June 2, while pubs and restaurants could only open for outdoor service on June 7. 

While some independent restaurants are eyeing legal action over not being able to fully open, indoor and out, pubs are not planning such a move.

Legal advice

It is understood pub groups have sought legal advice over their forced closure on numerous occasions during the Covid crisis over the past 14 months, but that the advice, each time, has been against court action.

Publicans in England have failed in their legal bid to fast-track indoor opening. 

However, that result is being viewed as academic as it was unlikely that a hearing would be held before May 17, the day English pubs can reopen for indoor hospitality. Pubs here, however, still have no dates on indoor reopening and are urging clarity.

“It is vital that a date is provided as soon as possible for indoor service to resume,” a spokesperson for the Licensed Vintners’ Association (LVA) said. 

If the Government is serious about having a summer of domestic tourism then pubs and all hospitality businesses need to be able to allow customers indoors as soon as the vaccine rollout progresses and it is safe enough to do so." 

The VFI has said that the “short-term solution” of opening outdoor services must be followed by a resumption of indoor service. It will take years for pubs to fully recover, it said. 

Pandemic unemployment payment

Meanwhile, the latest figures for the number of people requiring the pandemic unemployment payment, or PUP, this week show a large number of workers from pubs, food service, and accommodation still depend on the payments.

Overall, the numbers on the PUP have fallen by 18,000 to below 400,000 as some construction workers go back to reopened building sites. 

However, at 99,100 people, accommodation and food service accounts for almost one in four of all PUP claimants, amid concerns that the longer the restrictions on businesses like pubs last, the larger the threat that businesses will fail to reopen and that workers will drop into long-term unemployment.  

Other large groups include retail workers, at over 63,360, and other person-facing businesses like hairdressing, which has 32,940 people requiring the PUP. Restrictions will lift in many of those workplaces in the coming weeks.