Pubs that do not offer a substantial meal to customers are due, or may be due, to open next Monday. I note the comment by the deputy chief medical officer that there is a week to decide on this matter. The Civil Service can work for a while in splendid isolation from economic realities or at least until the economy cannot afford to pay their salaries. For small businesses, however, there are preparations to be made, including getting in new stock. Many of these pubs are family-run businesses and the owners have to make arrangements for their families. They need to know in advance what is happening. We cannot tell them on Monday morning that they can open at 10 a.m. that day.

When will the statutory instrument that will govern this issue be published? Thus far, we have had relevant statutory instruments published two or three days after they come into effect. That does not amount to the rule of law because one cannot regulate one's behaviour in accordance with something that is not published and we cannot prosecute somebody for not adhering to something they cannot even see. When will the statutory instrument be published so that people can have certainty as to what is happening?

Pubs are included in the reopening plan for next Monday. I have been contacted by numerous publicans expressing their frustration and worry concerning the lack of advice provided to them on what they must do to prepare or whether they will be opening at all. I understand that public safety is paramount and we must do everything in our power to safeguard it. However, we need a concrete plan for publicans setting out what they must do to reopen and what guidelines they must abide by to ensure public safety remains the top priority.

Publicans all over the country are at the end of their tether at the continuing uncertainty as to whether they can reopen next week. Stocks needed to be ordered yesterday if they are to open next Monday. Some publicans took the gamble by ordering but more did not because they do not know where they stand. We seem to have completely forgotten that there are 50,000 jobs on the line. Pub owners need clarity as to whether they can open their doors. That is what I am hearing from every publican in west Cork. I am pleading with the Taoiseach to give them that clarity and let them order their stock and reopen their businesses. We should bear in mind that if we have one or two pubs opening at one end of the street and none at the other end, we will have a congestion of people at the first end. If we instead allow all the pubs in a town to open, that will at least spread out the numbers.

I do not know whether the Government is serious about the pandemic. While pub and shop owners, families and everyone else have suffered, people continue to be allowed into the country from abroad. The Taoiseach said earlier that the people are law abiding and that is, of course, true. However, they are also furious at what is happening at the ports and airports. The Taoiseach knows, because he was there, that I have been asking NPHET, Dr. Holohan and others, from the very start, about the ports and airports remaining open. Deputy Shortall asked how many personnel had been assigned to those locations but she was not given an answer. The Government was trying to fool the Irish people. We are expected to take all the medicine while, at the same time, people from areas with scary Covid numbers are let into the country by aeroplane. The Taoiseach is saying that the number involved is limited but it is not fair to business people, publicans, shop owners and their families that they are being treated in this way. Pub owners need to know when they can open. Above all, if we do not seal the airports and stop people coming in from abroad, the results will be tragic.

To be fair, I recall the pub owners themselves, in tandem with the previous Government, saying that they needed to close at the time they did close. In terms of the reopening under phase 4 of the roadmap, there will be a Government meeting tomorrow to discuss it. NPHET is meeting today and will give us its up-to-date advice. I am taken by some of the points made by Deputies McNamara, Cahill, Michael Collins and Mattie McGrath in terms of a rules-based approach sometimes being far more effective. I said earlier that what is of more danger than anything is a situation where we have 30 or 60 people at a house party or parties taking place on certain roads in our cities, and we will have to do something about that. I am making the same point that Deputies Collins and Cahill were making that where there are rules, behaviour follows.

The Garda Síochána has indicated that while its members did have some challenging experiences the weekend before last in identifying breaches under Operation Navigation, the large majority of premises were compliant. The reports this weekend likewise suggest a large degree of compliance with the rules. That said, there are other issues arising in terms of the virus itself and its activity levels, and all of that has to be taken in the round. We will get the advice today and will make a decision tomorrow. I am taken by the point regarding the need to give people notice and allow them time to prepare. I accept that point.