A Motherwell pub that had to shut its doors after being caught in the crossfire of the North Lanarkshire coronavirus outbreak has now reopened its doors to customers.
The Railway Tavern immediately shut after it was discovered that a staff member had links to the Sitel call centre outbreak.
The pub underwent a deep clean and all staff were tested for Covid-19, with five now self-isolating for 14 days.
Speaking to Glasgow Live, Gerard Ross, co-owner of The Railway Tavern, said: "We found out on Monday morning. I happened to be in the pub when we learnt the news and we made the decision to shut immediately.
"We've been very careful to stay within all the government guidelines since reopening a couple weeks ago. Before this all happened, we were only doing bookings and if we couldn't do track and trace, we weren't serving you. We also had an ordering scheme in place at the bar to limit any contact with our staff as well.
"When we first reopened two weeks ago, the track and trace system was a bit of a sticking point for some of our customers, but everybody gets used to it."
The Railway Tavern, which reopened yesterday, has been up front with customers about the situation on social media and provided information about the steps taken to ensure the pub is safe for customers to return to.
Gerard explained: "We have now reopened. We knew we needed to be open and up front with our customers about what was going on and explain what we were doing about it.
"We're a family business and have been here for 36 years - our father started the pub and we're very involved with the community. We weren't going to be putting anyone at risk. I can't imagine why anyone would thinking it's better to act differently."
Gerard is one of the staff members now self-isolating for two weeks following the outbreak in order to ensure that no further infection spreads.
He said: "It was one of these things. With the nature of this disease, it was always going to happen - we just hoped it would not happen to us.
"Five members of staff have had to self isolate. I'm one of them - I'm just hoping these two weeks go by quickly and I can get back to work."
