Hospitality industry hits boiling point

Consultation must be better than confrontation as the fight to save the sector is ramped up, writes Stephen Jardine

Boiling point is the temperature at which the vapour pressure of a liquid is equal to the pressure of the atmosphere on the liquid. For water that means 100C. For the hospitality sector that means the latest coronavirus restrictions, extended again this week.

The closure of bars and restaurants in the Central Belt and limitations on trading outside this area had been due to expire on Monday. However, the First Minister announced it would “not be safe” to ease the measures yet ahead of the introduction of a new five- tier virus alert system in early November.

Nicola Sturgeon stressed none of the decisions were taken lightly and offered a glimmer of hope that the measures were starting to have a positive effect. However, they are also pushing the hospitality sector closer to breaking point. One leading chef told me the extension, without any consultation with the industry, was “the final straw”.

Within hours, a coalition of leading hospitality groups had launched a legal challenge against the Scottish Government claiming “the battle is now on to save the hospitality sector”.

The group, which includes the Scottish Licensed Trade Association and UK Hospitality, says the restrictions are simply based on anecdotal evidence and research from Northern Ireland proves closing hospitality has a negligible effect.

“The hospitality industry has been held up as a sacrificial lamb,” said former SLTA chief executive Paul Waterson. "The economic support offered to premises doesn’t come close to compensating the businesses and means jobs are being lost and livelihoods ruined.”

At the same time, leading industry operators including Tom Kitchin, Carina Contini and James Thomson launched a campaign to highlight the 100,000 hospitality jobs under threat.

They say continued restrictions without proper economic mitigation could decimate the industry and all the jobs associated with it on the frontline and in the supply chain around the country.

Down south, hospitality workers marched on Westminster this week to highlight their plight by banging pots and pans. Up here that approach doesn’t feel appropriate as the death toll mounts and social distancing becomes more important than ever.

But that doesn’t mean the same anger doesn’t exist here. Everyone in hospitality gets the scale of the challenge for government. No one working in the sector wants to put wealth before health but there is a feeling that hospitality is being hung out to dry as an easy target when the real reasons for the rising infection rate are elsewhere.

All of this could have been avoided with more consultation.

In Glasgow, Eusebis café and deli is trading today because it went to court this week and defeated Glasgow City Council in a battle over who should be allowed to operate under current restrictions.

Leaving the definition of what is a café and what is a restaurant to environmental health officers was always going to be problematic but that is what happens when decisions are taken in haste without any discussion with those who really know – the people who run cafes and restaurants.

Coronavirus is a fast- moving enemy and consultation in politics often means kicking something into the long grass. But regular discussions on the best way forward could have kept the sector on board and avoided ending up where we are now with battle lines drawn and the fight just beginning.