Christmas Eve closure devastating blow to restaurants and gastro pubs

The closure of pubs and gastropubs at 3pm on Christmas Eve is another devastating blow to the industry in what has been an extremely difficult year.

Restaurants and gastro pubs that have been planning to cater for their customers over the Christmas period were left with fresh produce and stock that couldn't be used.

"It was a hard pill to swallow in an extremely tough year, " said Dermot McDonnell of the Cross Guns Gastro Pub.

"Of all industries gastropubs and restaurants have gone out of their way to exercise best practice in social distancing, reducing capacity and training staff," Mr McDonnell said on Morning Ireland this morning.

"We have done an excellent job at keeping customers safe.

"I was shopping yesterday and saw a complete lack of social distancing and overcrowding.

"What I saw in the shops and on the streets were the opposite of what I have in my restaurant."

Mr Mc Donnell said that he had a large number of staff that had to be looked after in the short term and the long term.

"I have fridges full of fresh produce. We pride ourselves on shopping local, using local suppliers and trying to support local industries.

"I'm going to have to go back to those suppliers now and look them in the eye and ask them to take them back, knowing they won't have an outlet for it.

"The knock -on effect is huge.

"We are going to have to get on our phone today and cancel all our bookings and try and plan for another unknown.

"We know we are closing, but we don't know when we are opening," he said.