Hotels, restaurants and pubs are seeking an extension of the wage subsidy and a waiver of commercial rates to last for at least another year to help them get back on their feet in the wake of the pandemic.
Representative groups have told an Oireachtas committee that they want restart grants to meet the cost of reopening, as well as a commitment that the 9% VAT rate will stay in place until at least 2025.
Pubs, restaurants and hotels employing more than a quarter of a million people have been closed for much of the past year.
Today their representative groups were before the Oireachtas tourism committee where they painted a picture of a sector in deep crisis.
Adrian Cummins of the Restaurant Association of Ireland said 50% of its members face permanent closure in the wake of the pandemic.
He said restaurants need to know the plans for reopening viably with indoor dining, saying just a fifth of restaurants are capable of operating outdoors.
The Licensed Vintners Association, which represents Dublin pubs, said the Government must clarify the circumstances that would allow them to reopen - such as what percentage of the adult population would have to be vaccinated and whether they would be able to open for vaccinated customers only.
Donall O'Keeffe of the LVA said there must be no distinction between pubs serving food and those that do not - a view echoed by the Vintners Federation of Ireland, which represents rural pubs.
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Meanwhile, the Irish Hotels Federation said many of its members are using what it described as their much depleted reserves to repay bank loans, and they called on the Government to intervene to ensure moratoriums are applied.
The LVA, which represents pubs that account for 30% of the national on-trade market and employ 12,000 people, said it knows that the most effective pathway for the sector to reopen is as rapid a vaccine rollout as possible.
But it said it wants to know whether it will be the case that pubs and hospitality can only reopen for vaccinated customers?
The LVA pointed out that wet bars, late bars and nightclubs in Dublin closed on March 15 last year and have not reopened at all since, meaning they have now been closed for 372 days.
Dublin pubs serving food have been shut on three occasions over the last year and have only traded for 105 days of the last 372.
"They have also had to deal with the appalling "will they, won't they reopen" through several NPHET/Govt review dates July-October of last year," the organisation said.
Regarding financial supports, the LVA said that while Government assistance to the sector has proven a real lifeline, the Covid Restrictions Support Scheme (CRSS) needs to be doubled for hospitality businesses.
It also stated that the entire licensed trade will require a significantly enhanced Restart Grant prior to opening again, set at a level double the payment businesses received last summer.
The LVA also wants the Employment Wage Subsidy Scheme to be extended to March of next year and the extension of the CRSS for businesses who cannot generate more than 25% of their average weekly 2019 turnover because of any ongoing public health restrictions.
The Dublin publicans group also recommended that the waiver on commercial rates for licensed premises be pushed out to the end of March 2022 as well as the extension of the 9% VAT rate for hospitality to the end of 2025.
Meanwhile, the chief executive of the Vintners Federation of Ireland has also called on the Government to indicate what conditions will be required for pubs to re-open.
Speaking on RTÉ's Today with Claire Byrne, Padraig Cribben said they are not suggesting that the Government should give a date for re-opening, but it should give an an indication of the level of vaccination required and the levels at which community transmission and hospitalisation need to be at for his members to re-open.
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He said there are so many mixed messages coming from the Government, which he said is creating an uncertainty that is unnecessary.
Many pubs have been closed 12 months and some of them, which have been in place for generations, are under severe threat and "the mental pressure of that is alarming".
Mr Cribben said that two things are in very short supply in the sector - cash and hope.
He said that pub businesses accept that public health must come first, but this must be done against the background of treating people as adults and they need to hear the conditions under which they can get their businesses up and running again.
He said it is not just about the 7,000 publicans - it is about their 50,000 staff, the musicians who play in the pubs, the comedians who use them as venues, the engineers who fix the refrigeration and the local suppliers who provide food and drink.
Meanwhile, hotels are being forced to use their "much depleted reserves" to continue to repay banks, despite being closed for much of the past year, according to their representative body.
The Irish Hotels Federation said there is an "unnecessarily restrictive credit policy" being applied in Ireland and asked the Government and Central Bank to review this approach.
The IHF's chief executive Tim Fenn said about 80% of its members would apply for a moratorium if the option was available to them, but at the moment just 40% have been able to.
"There was great disappointment when the European Banking Authority decided to reactivate its guidelines on moratoriums last October, but Irish banks and the Central Bank chose to go on a case by case basis," he told the Oireachtas Committee on Media, Tourism, Culture, Sport and the Gaeltacht.
"What this has meant is that, we believe, an unnecessarily restrictive credit policy is hiding behind this case by case method. And we will ask the Government to engage with the banks and the Central Bank to go and review this approach," he added.
He was responding to questions from Fianna Fail's Christopher O'Sullivan, who said there is a "varying approach" between banks.
