I am also of the view that the Taoiseach should be here. He gave a press conference less than an hour ago. What is going on? Last summer we were able to have indoor dining without major incident and without vaccines. Now, 12 or 13 months later, and we are in a situation where more than 4 million vaccines have been administered and, despite already being an outlier in the context of Europe and the rest of the world, the Government is going to delay the reopening of the hospitality industry. That is pure madness. The Government is also planning a system of apartheid whereby it will introduce a two-tier society and create a situation in which families will be able to dine together indoors while young people are left outside. We expect those young people to serve in restaurants - and we know why - and work in other parts of the hospitality sector, in tourism outlets, in coach hire businesses and as tour guides.

NPHET advice is completely bonkers. It lacks both balance and an understanding of reality. Delaying the reopening of indoor entertainment, pubs and restaurants is like taking another wrecking ball to the economy. The lives of tens of thousands of individuals and families will be destroyed. People are holding on by their fingernails. A total of 200,000 jobs are on the line as the Government delays the return of indoor dining. There is a chance that the jobs in question could be lost permanently. It is not only indoor dining that will be affected but all indoor activities that we know of and the hospitality sector in general, including buses, taxis, you name it.

The discrepancy in the NPHET advice is so disproportionate it reminds me of the figures that were tossed around on the night before the bank guarantee was put in place. Its advice to the Government last evening was that the worst-case scenario would potentially see 700,000 cases of the virus in July, August and September, with as many as 2,170 deaths - God help us, that is a frightening figure - if the variant becomes dominant. The most optimistic projection is for 81,000 cases and 161 deaths. Which is it? The discrepancy between the two is a multiple of ten. This group of experts is advising the Government there might be 7,600 cases a day or there might be 800. Which is it? I ask the Minister to bring in an outside, independent - and probably from abroad - panel of experts. We have many scientists and doctors but they have all been silenced and banished. I also call out the media, which has run with this as if it were gospel. What is happening is outrageous.

We need an independent analysis of the NPHET advice. We have none. Has the Government sought independent advice? It was told this last night at a pre-Cabinet meeting. Did Ministers ask the questions? They are the people responsible to the House and, by extension, to the people. Will they send in Dr. Holohan to answer questions? He will not answer them and does not even meet us any more. Opposition leaders have not been briefed. This is outrageous. It is nonsense that is being dressed up as modelling. It is outrageous and is aimed at dividing our country and ruining it. It is dividing people. It is not going to run and it will not be accepted. I tell the Minister that.

NPHET modelling over the past 12 months has been wrong on almost every occasion. It has been wrong, wrong, wrong. It has been stupid and illogical. This is the most illogical idea I have ever seen. For the Taoiseach to wait until last night and earlier today to tell those people who have been expecting and anticipating for months that they would be reopening their businesses next Monday is shocking and disgraceful. They have spent money on stock, deep cleaning their premises and retraining staff. They have made all these efforts and they have been thrown under the bus again. It is outrageous.

Throughout this crisis - I said this in opposition and I say it now as a member of the Government - we have done it correctly in the context of sharing information.

The letter from NPHET, modelling information and access to public health officials to be able to answer whatever questions on modelling or any other aspect of its advice are critical and will happen. That is needed.

It is complex. Modelling is based on assumptions. It is not a certain science. As the Deputy said, the modelling possibilities range from there being no Delta variant by the end of September resulting in 55 possible cases ICU to the most pessimistic scenario. In that instance, the modelling is pessimistic in terms of the transmissibility of the Delta virus. It examines how similar we would be to last summer in terms of modelling what happened when we reopened hospitality and taking the most negative prognosis on that. As the Deputy said, the analysis in that most pessimistic scenario foresees 1,685 people in ICU.

The approach on this is not, on this occasion, to look at the case numbers. The circumstances have changed between this year and last. The number of people who will get into severe health difficulties or, God help us, die because of Covid will be a tiny fraction of what it would have been previously because most of our older people have been vaccinated. NPHET said - it could be right but it is not certain - that if we had the sort of case numbers its modelling tells it is possible, we would have those sorts of numbers in ICU. In those circumstances, our hospital system would be in trouble again. That is what we need to prevent. I believe we can prevent it.

The key way of preventing that is to get the 370,000 AstraZeneca vaccines which are arriving today to people aged in their 60s and those who have acute medical or other conditions who received a first AstraZeneca dose and are waiting for a second. We will have all of them done by 19 July, and that is of critical importance. Not only that, the rules will be changed to allow younger people to use the 100,000 surplus AstraZeneca vaccines that will be available after those aged 60 years and older have been vaccinated. We will also shorten the gap to four weeks between the first and second such AstraZeneca dose.

There were not just decisions around hospitality made yesterday. A number of decisions were made and advice was given which allows us to address the health crisis aspect of this. I believe we will not see another wave. Rather, we will have learned from last summer and will have more of an outer summer and open hospitality and other sectors this summer. I fully understand the critical importance of that for our communities and small family businesses and social life. We will do it in a safe way, which is thought through. We are thinking today about health advice so that we put a proper plan in place to be able to do that without creating a health risk.

I have heard it all now from a Cabinet Minister: NPHET could be right and might be right. The Minister went on to say that he personally does not believe there will be 7,600 cases and there might be instead 800 cases. What is going on in the Cabinet room? Are the ears completely dúnta? Is the Cabinet going to consult industry 15 months on, having demoralised and destroyed it? Will the Government dispense with the services of Dr. Holohan and NPHET? A cabal, I call them. Will it dispense with NIAC? We have all these unelected experts.

The Taoiseach is accountable to the House and so is the Minister. The Green Party has ten Deputies in this coalition Government and has major sway when it wants to. If the Minister believes NPHET is wrong in its advice, act on that and protect our families and support our people. Ní neart go cur le chéile. Give the young a chance. We have all made sacrifices, including many with their lives and many who became sick. People have put their shoulders to the wheel. We are all in this together. My God, the Government left that a long time ago.

The Government cannot have it both ways. The Minister has said he does not believe it will be as bad as NPHET said. It is playing scaring games. RTÉ and all the media have been paid off handsomely to sell the message of fear to our people. The Government should have respect for our people and not dose them with fear, threats and everything else. Old people are afraid to come out of their houses and go back to mass or shopping. All of the rest of the world has opened up for indoor dining except for us in Ireland. No one believes the Government. It has lost the public, and it has lost them badly.

I believe we will be able to follow the less pessimistic and more optimistic modelling scenarios because I believe in the capabilities, strength, solidarity and good common sense of the Irish people to steer a safer course.

Will it be Christmas?

That will also see us open up our country - every aspect of life. I also believe in our public service. We all make mistakes, the political system, the public service system and others, but-----

Fifteen months of mistakes.

The Government is making them.

-----we will not say that we should get rid of all our advisers and our health system. Our health system-----

We should get rid of the Government, too.

-----has stood up and shown real capability, including our advisers, in this crisis. It is right that we in the political system question them-----

They are not accountable to the Dáil.

-----and we do not just accept the advice and immediately adopt whatever solution is suggested.

You did.

No, we did not.

Last night you did.

What we decided was to hear the evidence. We listened to it, we realised it was serious-----

A fait accompli.

Rather than making an immediate decision late at night, we decided to take our time to talk to the various Departments involved, the industry and-----

They will not talk to the Government.

-----the unions and come up with an approach that gives us health protection while keeping us on a path towards reopening that will not close again. Not going backwards is the key and what the Irish people want.

That is what we are committing to trying to provide.