Scottish Government restrictions which hit hospitality over the festive period hasn’t made “any difference” to Covid cases.
Dumfries publican Stephen Montgomery, who is also a spokesperson for the Scottish Hospitality Group, said the move only caused people to have gatherings at home instead of in controlled environments of pubs and restaurants.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon warned of a “tsunami of cases” of the Omicron variant at the start of December before the Scottish Government urged people to cancel Christmas parties hitting the hospitality sector.
Even tighter restrictions were brought in immediately after Christmas Day but UK Government statistics showed that Scotland had a higher rate of cases than England in the seven days to December 31. In Scotland there were 1,900 cases per 100,000 compared to 1,600 per 100,000 in England.
It has lead to claims the restrictions came at little benefit to keeping case numbers down.
Stephen Montgomery, who runs the Townhead Hotel in Lockerbie and the Jolly Harvester in Dumfries, said: “Hospitality is always the first panic button pressed and it hasn’t made any difference. All it’s done is drive people to house parties over Christmas and New Year.
“Instead of allowing them to be a in the controlled and safe environments of a licensed premises where they can socially enjoy themselves and be looked after.
“But instead hospitality has suffered yet again. As well as not even just through the 10 day self isolation rule which took an extra two weeks to be brought down to seven days in line with the rest of the UK.
“Hospitality has also had minimal support packages which we’re supposed to be getting before Christmas but has yet to materialise into bank accounts.
“I think it’s about time they have another look at the restrictions and lift them completely.”
Ms Sturgeon said: “I would urge significant caution about the seven-day rolling average of cases in any part of the UK because of the disruption to reporting over the Christmas and new year period and the different pattern of testing in the holiday period.”
