The story of a disabled man being asked to leave The Savoy Hotel in Limerick has sparked outrage online.
Jay Reddin took to Facebook last night to share the story which involved his friend Ronan.
“Just over an hour ago I went to the Savoy to meet a friend of mine Ronan who travelled up in a wheelchair from Killarney to Limerick to hang out. The Savoy were nice enough to contact my phone on Ronan’s behalf to let me know he arrived,” he wrote.
Jay mentions that in the past, The Savoy have been kind and accommodating to Ronan’s needs. On this particularly night however, Ronan was told he needed to vacate the area he was in as he was blocking customer traffic.
“Ronan was forced to leave in the lashing rain even though they served him food and he had a half a pint with two straws when I arrived. Ronan was a paying customer and there was plenty of room in the lobby for him to wait but no, out into the fucking rain they wanted him and I was there as witness this all myself,” writes Jay.
The manager of The Savoy Hotel, Ronan Branigan, spoke to The Limerick Leader and denied that the staff had unfairly discriminated against Ronan.
“The early signals are that we had a wheelchair guest in the lobby of the savoy last night, and the wheelchair was quite large and cumbersome,” said Branigan.
“As far as we can understand at the moment, he was asked just to move across the front of the reception, out of the fire escape way which was being blocked, and unfortunately the communication was misunderstood or misconstrued and taken to be a request to leave the hotel, which it certainly wasn’t,” he said.
Branigan also added that the hotel have reached out to Ronan to explain the circumstances.
“We’re very sorry that the information was misconstrued in that way, but it was certainly not the intention,” he concluded.
We have reached out to the hotel for a comment.
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