Time to get the economy moving again says O'Leary

(Above) Michael O'Leary.

The speed of Ireland's emergence from lockdown is too “conservative” and should be speeded up, Ryanair chief Michael O'Leary believes.

Speaking on Morning Ireland earlier, the Mullingar native said that while the government and health authorities “have done a great job” in the battle against COVID-19, the current restrictions should be lifted faster to boost economic activity.

“Monday was a great day for Ireland when we had zero deaths from COVID, but Ireland like a great many other European countries is now emerging out from the lockdown period. We are emerging much slower and in a much more conservative way and restricted manner than most other European countries. We can and should do more. It's time to get the economy moving,” he said.

Ryanair will start flying to Spain, Italy and other European countries again from July 1. Mr O'Leary said that Irish people can fly safely once they wear facemasks. Both the European Centre for Disease Control and the European Safety Agency have supported the resumption of air travel if staff and passengers wear facemasks, he said.

Under the new measures being introduced tomorrow, travellers coming into Ireland will be legally required to fill out a COVID-19 Passenger Locator Form saying where they can be contacted. While they will be asked to self-isolate for 14 days, Minister for Health Simon Harris has said that making self-isolation mandatory is “tricky, legally”.

O'Leary says that new quarantine measures being introduced are “ineffective”.

“The concept of a quarantine is completely ineffective if you don't quarantine people at the airport. Once you allow them onto Dublin Bus, once you allow them into taxis, if you have a coronavirus positive person then the infection spreads. A quarantine that gets imposed only after you use public transport to get to your eventual destination is not a quarantine it is simply political game playing,” he said.