Micheál Martin: State-paid voucher plan for hospitality sector should be considered

Micheal Martin. Photo:Gareth Chaney/Collins

State-paid vouchers for hotels, restaurants, and pubs should be given to people to incentivise the use of services as the pandemic eases, Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin has suggested.

In an interview with the Irish Examiner, Mr Martin also warned against any politician or party springing a snap election in the autumn amid the health and economic crises.

As government formation talks progress amid expectation that Mr Martin will be Taoiseach in a new coalition, he stressed the need to support businesses and the hospitality sector in a recovery.

“The most important point is that they will need cash, access to cash and low interest rate loans,” he said.

Mr Martin said he welcomed the announcement of a €2bn loan scheme for firms made by the government —which Fianna Fáil had fed into — over the weekend.

“In terms of our domestic services, our hospitality, significant supports will be required to underpin cash flow initially,” he said.

He said cash supports and liquidity were more important than potentially lowering Vat for the tourism sector, something which could be examined once premises were open once again.

“I think the Vat rate is something that can be considered when they are reopened and when demand picks up again,” he said.

“The one thing we can’t call is human behaviour and will human behaviour move back quickly into restaurants and pubs? That’s the unknown quantity.

“Will they revert back to normal behaviour? Covid is going to be with us for quite some time.

I like the idea of giving supports to restaurants and pubs and other places where they may have to put in barriers or infrastructure to facilitate proper social distancing.

“There will be a different range of supports. You could be looking at in the future maybe giving supports to citizens to avail of hospitality, to encourage them, to incentivise them to go to hotels, to restaurants and others.”

Mr Martin said vouchers could work for this.

“These are all in the mix in the future because we are going to have to stimulate demand,” he said.

Mr Martin said he was “not fazed” by a weekend poll which saw Fine Gael surge to 35%, while Fianna Fail fell to just 14%.

In recent days, junior Fine Gael ministers, discussed the possibility of a snap election in the autumn following a renewed confidence among the party.

However, asked would Fianna Fáil be ready if there was a snap election, Mr Martin said: “The public would be very annoyed and very angry with politicians of all colours if they suddenly sprung a general election on them in the midst of all this.

“A health crisis and an economic crisis, some politicians are thinking that they could chance that, well good luck to them.”