Vivienne Clarke
The chairman of the Entertainment Industry Alliance, Dan McDonnell, has repeated a call for the Digital Covid Cert to be used as a method of access to live events.
The €3.5 billion industry which employs 35,000 will require “continued meaningful engagement” with the Government, he told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland.
The use of the digital cert as a method of access would “kick start” the events economy, he added. A date for the reopening of the sector needed to be set as soon as possible.
Sector specific supports would also need to be kept in place until June 2022 to allow the sector time to recover.
Mr McDonnell said that engagement with the Government needed to be meaningful and “not a box ticking exercise”.
There was a “huge sense of disappointment” within the industry at the lack of progress to date. “We are simply looking to reopen and to get back to work” he said.
“What we are proposing is use of the (digital) cert” along the same lines as it was used for the return of the hospitality sector, he said.
There had been 40,000 in Croke Park for the All Ireland hurling final with no vaccination certs or temperature checks required.
Mr McDonnell said that the sector was willing to return using specific public health requirements. “We’re not going to put people’s lives at risk.”
Organising events safely “that’s what we’re good at”.
