Bishop’s Gate Hotel
Ciaran O’Neill, who employs 81 staff at Bishop’s Gate hotel who are all now on furlough, told BBC Radio Foyle today that local businesses need to know what lockdown being lifted “step-by-step” will look like.
First Minister Arlene Foster had earlier told Radio Ulster that reopening the North of Ireland would be a “step-by-step process”.
“It will not just be a complete reopening again, because that would be wrong,” she said.
Replying to Mrs Foster’s comments on Good Morning Ulster, Mr O’Neill says businesses have been asking the first minister questions around the exit strategy for “a number of weeks”.
Businesses need more information, more guidance and what those support packages will look like for the phased return, Mr O’Neill told the programme.
“We need some dates,” Mr O’Neill stresses.
Mr O’Neill believes the tourism sector could lose at least 20,000 jobs in the next three to six months and any support package should reflect that.
“Hospitality was the first to close down and will probably be one of the last to open,” he says.
Trade body Hospitality Ulster says it believes that as a result of the lockdown around 25 per cent of restaurants and bars in the North of Ireland will never open again.
