Chamber and committees

Regrettably it is not yet possible to lift any of the restrictions today as doing so risk all of the hard won progress that people in Aberdeen have made.

Provided we continue to see a downward trend in case numbers – in the days ahead – we will allow non-licensed hospitality to reopen from next Wednesday, 26 August. This will be subject to compliance checks at those individual businesses. We will keep this under constant review.

On 26 August, we will review the restrictions on licensed premises and provide a clear timetable for lifting the restrictions on those businesses and the other restrictions affecting travel, household numbers and visits to care homes.

Our decision has been informed by the advice of the Grampian Incident Management Team (IMT), local clinical advice as well as our own Scottish Government clinical advice. We have taken into account all the evidence and data available and have benefited from a detailed discussion with local government colleagues.

We will also confirm today that a new £1m grant support scheme – delivered by Aberdeen City Council - will be made available for businesses impacted by restrictions. The Scottish Government has been working with Aberdeen City Council to ensure we can get the fund up and running in the next day or so.

This will provide grants of between £1,000 and £1,500 to those businesses most affected. The level of grants are relatively small to reflect the temporary nature of the disruption to business, to ensure proportionality with other COVID-19 business support schemes.

Given the wider implications of restrictions on sectors not required to close by the regulations - such as certain shops or businesses in the supply chain – the fund will include £100k of discretionary support for those businesses too.