Hospitality sector says government support needed to keep doors open

Restaurant and Catering Association chief executive, Wes Lambert, said comments have been “pouring” into the RCA’s head office for the past 10 days as omicron case numbers have spiked out of control.

The exploding cases numbers are causing unprecedented disruption to businesses during a non-lockdown period as industries from retail to hospitality are forced to shut down or scale back operations because their workforces are being decimated by staff falling sick or isolating – none more so than in the hospitality sector.

“This problem has many layers,” Mr Lambert said.

“First, hospitality is already suffering critical workforce shortage and the massive increase in case numbers, especially for those in the 18-24 years age bracket has left the industry with too few staff members to allow them [to] trade fully or in some cases to open at all.

“There are closed signs around the country on thousands upon thousands of doors as we deal with this spike in cases which is more in the past 10 days than in entire history of covid in Australia.

“The next layer is consumer confidence which is at an all-time low as for over 20 months all of Australia was conditioned to worry about case numbers and avoid covid like the plague.

“The final layer is that South Australia is the only state that has announced it will offer business support while NSW, Victoria and the Northern Territory have introduced either border or business restrictions over the past few [days].”

Compounding the issues is the reluctance of Australians to spend disposable income on dining out. According to the latest ANZ data on consumer spending, Australians dropped their spending on dining by 24 per cent in the last week of Christmas and it has not improved.

ANZ senior economist Adelaide Timbrell pinned the steeper decline in new year’s dining compared with previous years on the omicron virus wave.

“[It] is likely due to a mix of hospitality closures due to omicron outbreaks, lack of access to food delivery and cautious behaviour by prospective customers about spending time in public,” she said.

She added that Apple mobility data showed about half the gains in movement made since Australia’s delta outbreaks have been reversed because of omicron caution.

Mr Lambert said the reclassification of “close contact” as being almost only to occur in a home environment meant it was unsafe and reckless for hospitality businesses to expect employees to go to their place of work to get a rapid antigen test as has been suggested.

“The last place they should come is to work,” he said.

“As a country we need to realise that everyone will survive this. We know as an industry that productivity for the first quarter of this year is decimated. We are now in the eye of the cyclone but we need clear leadership on how we are going to get through the next wave if we are going to get the economy back on track by the middle of 2022.”