More than 100 pubs and restaurants warn PM of ‘bleakest of winters’ without urgent support
More than 100 hospitality firms, including JD Wetherspoon, Young’s and Cafe Nero, have written to the Prime Minister warning that many businesses will not survive “this bleakest of winters”, resulting in mass job losses, unless more is done to help the sector.
In a letter to Boris Johnson, businesses such as Fuller’s, Greene King and Pizza Express, led by trade associations the British Beer & Pub Association, UK Hospitality and the British Institute of Innkeeping, said the new 10pm curfew has “made this fight to survive even harder”.
Before the latest Covid-19 restrictions, which were introduced last week, half of all hospitality businesses said they did not believe they would survive beyond the middle of next year, the letter said.
The industry has urged the government to review the restrictions at least every three weeks and remove them if they are found to be impacting the spread of Covid-19.
The letter also states that the latest support measures announced by the chancellor do not “go nearly far enough for our imperilled sector.”
“Without an immediate review of the support on offer to pubs, restaurants and wider hospitality businesses, many will be lost for years to come,” the letter said.
Hospitality firms have called on Johnson to “intervene as a matter of urgency” and remove employer contributions for the hospitality sector to the Job Support Scheme and provide a package of grant funding for those businesses that face restrictions being brought forward.
It added that “the VAT cut and business rates holiday must also be extended through 2021 and beer duty cut.”