The chief executive of small firms group ISME said that granting an additional bank holiday next year must be done for "intelligent, justifiable reasons" and not because we have just come through a pandemic.
Neil McDonnell said that there is 'a whiff of 2006' of the suggestion that an additional bank holiday is needed, with the message appearing to say "let's all keep spending money".
He told the Today with Claire Byrne programme that awarding an additional bank holiday should be done to achieve standardisation in the European Union, with Ireland's nine bank holidays being one or two days fewer than many of its European neighbours.