A Kildare TD says the county is 'relieved' after being brought out of a local lockdown.
People there are waking up this morning to their first day out of localised restrictions.
Restrictions in the county were lifted with immediate effect on Monday, after the number of infections in the county went down.
James Lawless, Fianna Fáil TD for the Kildare-North constituency, told Ciara Kelly on Newstalk Breakfast it is a great relief.
"The county is relieved, it's been very difficult.
"We were in our third lockdown actually because like the rest of the country we went through the spring lockdown, we got some respite in sort of June/July, and then 7th of August we were back into lockdown and we stayed in lockdown when Laois and Offaly came out of it about 10 days ago.
"So really I suppose the mood is one of relief, people are just glad to be out of it."
"I think there was a psychological effect on people that, even though the restrictions - the restrictions massively hit local businesses - in terms of individual freedoms, they were't maybe as severe as the previous lockdown.
"But there was that kind of morale-sapping effect that 'We're back here again, when is this going to end?'
"So I think it was a great relief last night".
On extra supports for businesses, he said: "It's very difficult for businesses and I think particularly given the timing and particularly given the time of year.
"So you've businesses that have been closed right through sort of March, April, May who were getting maybe back on their feet in July, who had invested in PPE, who invested in screens, partitions, staff training and kind of started to rebuild confidence and rebuild themselves and then having to close again.
"And then of course with lots of the tourist season, any kind of - like the racing calendar here in Kildare, the fashion calendar - all kind of gone for that period of time."
"I suppose the good news is the Government have pledged extra supports: the Restart Grant, Restart Plus - all those kind of measures that were available to the rest of the country are also available to us.
"But we're getting extra packages to reflect that downtime.
"From a business point of view, we're probably three months behind the rest of the country".
