R&CA pushes new guidelines in an effort to reopen cafes and restaurants
Restaurant and Catering Australia is pushing a new set of guidelines and protocols for venues in an effort to allow them to open by June.
Among the new guidelines, customers who don’t have the Covid-19 tracing app would have to give venues their details before they could enter.
Restaurant and Catering Australia CEO Wes Lambert also said venues may have to introduce new safety protocols in order to open. These include socially distanced tables, disposable menus, no condiments on tables and bottles of hand sanitisers throughout the venue. Lowering the limit on “tap and go” payments to encourage people to go cashless was also a suggestion.
Speaking to The Australian, Lambert said “it's not a complicated thing”.
“We fully advocate the tracking app, in the absence of that the best practice is tracking or tracing,” Lambert said.
Lambert said a distance of 1.5m between tables would allow venues to operate about 50 or 60 per cent capacity, which is less than the government's suggestion of 4sqm between tables, which would only allow businesses to function at 25 per cent capacity.
“At 25 per cent capacity they just can’t open or can’t make money or trade effectively,” he said.
Sheridan Randall, 5th May 2020
