No suggestion Nphet is being gagged - Taoiseach
Nphet members Dr Cillian De Gascun, Director of the National Virus Reference Laboratory, Dr Colm Henry, Chief Clinical Officer HSE, Dr Tony Holohan, Chief Medical Officer and Dr Ronan Glynn, Deputy Chief Medical Officer at a press briefing. File picture: Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews.ie
Government ministers were “uneasy” that recommendations to reintroduce Covid-19 restrictions were leaked to the media before Cabinet ministers had them, Minister Michael McGrath has said.
Mr McGrath, who is the minister for public expenditure, was speaking after a weekend of media reports of considerable strain in the relationship between Cabinet and the National Public Health Emergency Team.
Mr McGrath hit back against Tánaiste Leo Varadkar describing the new restrictions as “peculiar” by saying the decisions on restrictions which were made by the Cabinet were unanimous.
Mr McGrath said the restrictions brought in on Friday were not peculiar and said he fully supports the decisions that the Government has made.
Also speaking today, Taoiseach Micheál Martin said there is no suggestion of Nphet being gagged or its independence being impacted upon.
He sought to play down suggestions of divisions within government over the role of Government, paying tribute to the role Nphet has played in battling the pandemic.
"Public Health will advise and the government will decide," he said.
Mr Martin said "co-ordination" was key in terms of Government messaging. He said he believes that Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan is aware of the importance of that co-ordination.
Mr Martin said public health was a key part of Ireland's response to the pandemic and he said he had no issue with the National Public Health Emergency Team, and he trusted its advice in the same way as the public. However, he added that there were areas where they could "streamline and evaluate".
"These measures are unanimously advised by NPHET and accepted by Government, [they] are designed to protect public health and life over the coming period, particularly in the context of Omicron which is a variant about which not enough is known and risks are better not to be taken in advance of that knowledge. It's better to be proactive than reactive," the Taoiseach said.
Addressing the Government decision to limit the public utterances from Nphet, Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe said it is appropriate that the messaging around Covid-19 must be subject to a much greater deal of “coordination”.
“Coordination is important,” he said.
He conceded that this week was a “challenging period” in terms of the messaging around the potential increase in restrictions before decisions were taken.
“As we were making decisions it was a challenging period because there were different views different pieces of information becoming available,” he said.
Mr Donohoe defended Mr Varadkar’s comments saying it was merely trying to put into context that hospitalisations are reducing and that the decision to introduce new restrictions was “a precautionary one”.
Mr McGrath said the Government values the advice given by public health experts and that the relationship between Cabinet and Nphet is a good one.
Sounding an optimistic note, Mr McGrath said the new restrictions introduced by the Government on Friday will be lifted if the Omicron variant turns out to be a milder variant than feared.
“If the findings of all the research that's going on globally into Omicron find that it does not meet our worst fears, then we will be in a position to remove those restrictions based on public health advice over the period ahead quite quickly,” he said.
Mr McGrath said however that there are simply no answers to some fundamental questions about what the impact of Omicron is, including is it more transmissible? How does it interact with the vaccine? Is it more dangerous at the level of each individual whom it infects?
He said answers are needed to those questions and the decisions the Government has made are precautionary in nature and based on public health advice.
He said incidences of Delta have stabilised, but are at a higher level than the Government would like, and more socialisation is expected in the run-up to Christmas.
Mr McGrath also revealed that he expects the Pandemic Unemployment Payment to be reinstated at the original rate of €350 for those who lose their jobs as a result of the new restrictions being imposed.
Mr Donohoe said that those who were on a reduced rate of support will not be able to attract the higher rate but will be restored at the lower rate of support.
Sinn Féin spokesperson on public spending Mairead Farrell said the mixed messaging on the pandemic response from Government is "incredibly frustrating" for the public and businesses.
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