Stand up for Freedom & Hospitality: Have lunch in the weirdest places!

Pencil-pushers have been regulating things since Adam wanted to leave the confines of the Garden, and someone had to write up a Standard Operating Procedure and a Health & Safety Policy before he could be allowed to go. I hate to think how many leeches had to be applied to Captain Cook before anyone let him land ashore in New Zealand in the mid-1700's. Now, nearly 250-odd years later or thereabouts, the hospitality sector is eagerly awaiting today's signed Covid-19 Response "traffic light framework", which should clearly identify how cafes, bars and restaurants are going to work with vaccination certificates in our brave new world.

Labour's new traffic light system punishes the unvaccinated, forces small businesses to police it, and punishes businesses who can't or won't do so!

The new system in New Zealand introduced by Labour to "control Covid-19" has two branches - the first is the vaccination certificate system, which has been touted as the means to "remove the freedoms of unvaccinated people". The second is the traffic light system, which enforces the vaccination certificate use in nearly every industry and sector in the country. 

From Friday December 3rd, word has it that if you want to go grab a latte you'll need to show your vaccination certificate to gain entry to your fave cafe in the High Street. The rub though is that most cafes simply don't have the staff capacity, especially in the heat of the lunch hour or smoko breaks, to make sure that everyone who sets even one foot in the door has a certificate evidencing that they have been vaccinated. I mean, stop and think about your favourite cafe's layout. It's crazy, right?

MBIE has set out it's guidance by saying that "Businesses operating under My Vaccine Pass rules must check customers' passes. We recommend at or near the point of entry, or as soon as possible after entry (for example, if there is only one staff member, this might be at the counter)". The layout of most cafes means that by the time you rock up through the queue to the counter to place your order, you'll already be inside. So isn't it too late by then to demand to see your certificate? After all, it kind of makes the whole certificate thing moot by the time you've stood for ten minutes in  the queue, touched the handles of all the food cabinets and tongs, and worked your way up to the counter.

Very few cafes will be in a position to hire a security guard to monitor the certs at the door either. That leaves cafes with something of a conundrum. Do they simply not check the vaccine certificates - not use them? If they do that, they will be severely restricted in an Orange or Red Scenario and completely unable to operate to capacity sufficient to justify opening at all.

In a Red scenario, without using certificate checking, cafes can only operate contactlessly (which will be almost impossible for most), and even with checks being undertaken on customers, all certificates have to be sighted, customers have to be seated and separated (good luck!), and there is still a 1m distancing rule.

At Orange, all certificates still need to be checked, but if you opt not to do this you again can only operate contactlessly.

At Green, used when there are "some" COVID-19 cases in the community - a level that arguably we may never leave again in our lifetimes - cafes will still have to operate with 1m distancing if they don't use certificate sightings, and their customers have to still be seated and separated.

What is so frustrating about all this is that anyone who has skin in the game - that would be cafe owners - know full well that these scenario's only create additional stresses for owners and staff alike. The government has implemented a system that was not designed to cut down on transmission of the virus (remember, MBIE said certificates could be checked at the counter!) and is purely a punitive effort aimed at unvaccinated people - most of whom won't be frequenting cafes anyway. We've already made alternative plans.

Government has introduced legislation to punish a select group of people, and given the task of policing it to small business owners who can least afford the means to do so, and who certainly don't need the aggro. Worse, Grant Robertson wants to punish businesses who refuse to punish the unvaccinated!

Well, I have a plan. A protest of sorts, but you can literally do it sitting down. It doesn't need a crowd, it doesn't need anything. A well-placed sign or two would help, but is completely unnecessary. Can we please use cafes as the means to show up the government's utter incompetence on this traffic light rubbish? 

Here's what YOU can do to signal your outrage at the stupidity of the pencil-pushers and their daft traffic lights, while at the same time making your stand for the freedoms of the unvaccinated. Go for coffee!

Yes, you read that right. Go out for coffee - on a traffic island (not a roundabout) in the main street of your town. Take your thermos of tea or coffee, your fold-up chair or your picnic blanket, and your picnic lunch. Head down town, and set up your own pop-up picnic anywhere on a grassy island in the middle of the main street - preferably near some traffic lights! Take a sign if you feel like you'd like to tell every driver passing you by why you are there. Take a friend. Take a teddy bear. Just find a spot to settle in for the lunch break. 

 Don't forget to wave to everyone with a cheerful smile. You're not just there to have your lunch - you're there to make a point and stand up for small hospitality businesses at the same time. With luck, by the time you've finished your lunch someone else will come for their lunch too. This is something that needs to take off, fellow protestors - it's time we just made the effort to push back on the stupidity of all this - even if it's just one of us at a time.

Are you vaccinated but can see the utter idiocy of this system for cafes, bars, and restaurants? Hospitality needs you happily vaccinated folks to stand with them too! Go buy your lunch at their cafe and support their business whenever you can, but come and eat it on a picnic blanket on the main street. 

Don't forget to selfie and post to your social media account to show you're doing your bit! Use the hashtag #CovidCafe to let us know where to find you!