Shops up to 200 square meters, hairdressers, bookstores and car stands reopen Monday – Observer

(In update)

Small retail stores up to 200 square meters and, regardless of size, hairdressers, car stands and bookstores will open from Monday, May 4, the Government announced to the social partners this Wednesday. According to the Observer found with the social partners, the Executive plans a gradual reopening: on May 18, if the evolution of the pandemic allows, stores up to 400 square meters will reopen and, in early June, the rest.

The Government met this Wednesday with the social partners and listened to the proposals of the employers’ and trade union confederations on the recovery of the economy. The Government’s plans are undergoing a reopening similar to what happened in the Czech Republic, where stores up to 200 square meters in size, later up to 400 meters and then the remaining commercial establishments resumed their activity.

Thus, the Government’s plans announced to the social partners go through a reopening in stages: small shops of up to 200 square meters and, for example, hairdressers, car stands and bookstores will reopen on Monday. On May 18, it is the turn of stores up to 400 square meters. In this case, the City Councils will have a special prerogative: that is, as long as they take responsibility, they will be able to open commercial spaces with areas greater than 400 square meters.

In the beginning of June, the others should open. The plan, as the government has always said, will depend on the evolution of the pandemic.

At the end of the meeting of the social consultation, the Minister of Labor, Ana Mendes Godinho, stressed that the Government is working with the social partners “in a common document of global guidelines on safety and health at work” for the recovery of the economy.

The Government meets this Wednesday afternoon with the political parties, also to announce how the reopening of commercial activity and services will take place.

At the end of the meeting with the Government, the president of the PSD, Rui Rio, said that the reopening in the first phase will cover the “smaller street stores”, which would leave out the shopping centers. This opening will require “the mandatory use of masks in closed spaces”, a suggestion from the PSD and which was accepted by the Executive.

The question of the reopening of shopping centers had been raised by the president of the Portuguese Association of Editors and Booksellers (APEL). In statements to Radio Observer, João Alvim said that the reopening of bookstores is “good news because the sector was dying and will be very hurt by this whole interval”. But he stressed that it is still necessary to know “in what conditions it opens and whether or not all [as livrarias] open ”, namely those in shopping centers.

“We do not know if there are any conditions for opening up”, he stressed, referring to the decision that will leave the Council of Ministers on Thursday, when the Government approves the measures for the resumption of economic activity.

As for the restaurants, Rui Rio said, in turn, that they will remain closed and that they will be opened, “in a balanced way”, in mid-May, during the second phase of reopening commercial establishments.

Catarina Martins, coordinator of the Bloco de Esquerda, underlined that “only the assessment of what the evolution of the epidemic itself is can determine whether reopenings continue or not. The health criterion remains very important ”.

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