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Hotel bars and pubs D-Day

To-day (Tuesday 4th August) is D-Day for hotel bars and pubs. hotelbar0820

The Cabinet is to decide later today on whether to proceed with Phase 4 of the country's reopening next Monday.

This would include the reopening of pubs and hotel bars as well as allowing gatherings up to 500 people outdoors.

It has been described as a 'make or break day' for the industry by the Vintners' Federation of Ireland, which represents 3,500 pubs outside of Dublin.

It said the already delayed reopening is putting a huge strain on publicans, their families and communities, who, the VFI said, have been forced to stand aside while big gatherings happen in uncontrolled environments like house parties.

Meanwhile, 106 towns and villages are to benefit immediately from €2.8m in funding to help communities adapt to a world changed by Covid-19.

Street furniture; widening of walkways and footpaths; adapting community spaces for socially-distanced use; outdoor cinema screens and marquees to facilitate ‘all-weather’ community events are some of the items to be funded.

Hotel bookings plummet

The latest industry survey* conducted by the Irish Hotels Federation reveals the enormous challenges facing hotels and guesthouses with demand plummeting year on year as elaina a results of the current crisis. Nationally, average room occupancy stood at 42% for July, compared with occupancy levels of over 90% for July last year. This is the largest year-on-year drop ever recorded by the Irish hotels sector for the peak summer season.

Bookings for August have also plummeted to levels broadly in line with those in July. Bookings for September show a further dramatic drop in occupancy levels to 24% nationally. This points to a very worrying outlook for the rest of the year. Meanwhile the CSO announced earlier this week that the number of overseas visitors to Ireland has by dropped by 97% year on year.

Breakdown of occupancy results for July 2020:

Shelbourne 'Slaves' are 'Princesses'

An art historian has said that the statues removed from outside the Shelbourne Hotel in Dublin were not slave girls but were instead “princesses”. slave0820

Kyle Leyden, who lectures at the University of London, told RTÉ Radio One’s Drivetime programme that the original catalogue the work was chosen from did not refer to the statues as slaves.

“In that printed catalogue, it appears that the man who originally created and sculpted the statues does not actually refer to them as slaves. He did not intend them to be read as slaves,” Leyden said.

“It was clear that the Egyptian statue at least was not in any way to be read as a slave. It was wearing a royal Egyptian headdress, which would indicate it was a princess,” he told the programme.

The four bronze statues – said to depict two Nubian princesses from the lower Nile and their slave girls holding torches – were recently removed from outside the historic hotel.

Knock predicts 75% fall

Knock Airport authorities expect passenger numbers to fall by 75 per cent this year as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Following a record year last year, which saw 807,000 passengers using Ireland West Airport, 2020 is expected to be its most challenging.

At the height of the lockdown, the airport was closed for 91 days with staff “furloughed” and all airport operations suspended.

This followed the news of key airline partner, Flybe, who had been operating from the airport for more than 10 years, ceasing trading in early March, with the immediate loss of their long-standing and popular services to Birmingham, Edinburgh and Manchester.

Ashford achieves biorisk standard

Ashford Castle and The Lodge at Ashford Castle have become the first hospitality venues in Ireland to be awarded the Global Biorisk Advisory Council (GBAC) STAR ashford0720 accreditation for the implementation of biorisk situation protocols.

The international accreditation was awarded to both Ashford Castle and The Lodge for the implementation of practices to prepare for, respond to and recover from pandemics. These practices include protocols for cleaning, disinfection and infectious disease prevention.

GBAC STAR is a division of worldwide cleaning industry association ISSA.