Our sector is not just about providing great experiences; it’s about providing opportunities, creating jobs and being a driving force for the economy. We all know this, of course, but with another of the government’s stated priorities being to get those out of work back into jobs, UKHospitality has been at the forefront of making sure those in Westminster understand how we can help achieve that goal.

 

This week, at UKHospitality’s annual Workforce & Skills conference, Alison McGovern MP, minister for employment, used the occasion to demonstrate the success of our efforts by endorsing the hospitality-specific training scheme UKHospitality has developed and pioneered.

 

The minister announced that the government would be rolling out our hospitality Sector Work Academies Programmes (SWAPs) to 26 new areas of the country, as part of its plan to extend the initiative and our work developing the hospitality skills passport.

 

The government has backed it because its own data showed the initiative proved to be a huge success in its pilot phase, with an 85% completion rate. What’s more, 80% of those completing the course are now employed in hospitality. But what does this mean, and how can operators benefit? 

 

SWAPs are bespoke pre-employment training courses that ensure jobseekers have the skills they need to get a job in hospitality. The programme takes 20 days, including ten days in a hospitality setting or classroom with an industry tutor, and five days of work experience with an employer who has apprenticeship or entry level vacancies. It also guarantees participants a job interview.

 

It ensures successful recruits arrive with their employer job-ready, after training in customer service, health and safety, hygiene and more. Delivering hospitality-designed training ahead of learning helps to break the cycle of underprepared candidates put forward by Jobcentres. 

 

The government’s decision to roll the programme out across the country is recognition of the success of the pilot phase and the role hospitality plays as an employer. It’s also testament to the work that hospitality businesses have put into making it a success, with more than 50 involved throughout the pilot.

 

Why is this announcement important? 

Of course, the elephant in the room is the £3.4bn of costs arriving in April, of which £2.9bn makes employing people much more expensive. Raising the impact of those costs has been our number one priority when it comes to our campaigning to government, and that has been done at the highest level – to the prime minister, chancellor and numerous secretaries of states and ministers – where we continue to press for a delay and a rethink. 

 

But alongside that, we’re continuing our work to make sure the talent pipeline into the sector is as strong as possible, because that remains critical. As we battle through these costs, we need great people joining our businesses that are job-ready and have the skills to hit the ground running. 

 

I’m confident that this initiative will be a pipeline for tens of thousands of people to join our sector, helping to bridge the ongoing recruitment challenge and helping to shift attitudes towards embarking on a career in the sector. 

 

The roll-out is also a ringing endorsement of the hospitality skills passport, a transferrable award that team members can earn to demonstrate their competence and qualifications. This digital passport will house all completed training, such as those completed in a SWAP, and is transferable from business to business. This will help keep track of progress and – crucially – eliminates the need for employers and employees to duplicate training when moving between companies.

 

With wider reform of the apprenticeship levy system and the skills landscape more broadly, this initiative could aid businesses to use more of their training funds for the skills they need.

 

The expansion of the scheme begins officially from April. It will set in motion a new partnership that brings together employers, jobseekers and the Jobcentre network to ensure that more people are trained to come into the sector. 

 

Work is already happening at pace with the Department for Work and Pensions, local authorities, local colleges and training providers to ensure we maximise this opportunity. Our preparation will put hospitality businesses at its heart so they can work closely with the schemes in relevant areas in order to benefit from newly trained recruits coming through.  

 

Anyone can register their details on the SWAP page on our website where they will be able to select regions where they’re interested in being involved. The scheme UKHospitality has put together really does deliver for businesses and employers, and I urge as many businesses as possible to get involved. 

When The Queen Victoria pub exploded during EastEnders’ 40th anniversary episode recently, its dire situation mirrored the wider difficulties faced by pubs across the nation. In England and Wales last year, six pubs shut for good each week, according to the British Beer & Pub Association.

 

The future looks increasingly bleak, with the forthcoming effects of the Budget expected to lead to further closures and job losses. The Adam Smith Institute, in its Last Orders Report, is forecasting that as many as 9,000 pubs are at risk from calling last orders for the final time.

 

Night-time economy advisor Sacha Lord has suggested the UK is now at risk of an “epidemic of chronic loneliness” if more is not done to save the local pub. Writing in the Daily Express, he says: “For thousands of elderly and isolated individuals, their local is a vital source of companionship and community.”

 

A decade ago, it was the elderly who were the greatest sufferers of loneliness, but by 2023, this had dramatically shifted to the young. Of people in their 20s, only 5% felt lonely in 2023, whereas today, this has jumped to 13%. This is a level way above every other age group, according to data from the European Social Survey, and it puts this British grouping as the loneliest in Europe. 

 

Taking more pubs out of the social equation is undoubtedly damaging, especially for the younger cohort who have gradually lost the connection with the pub that previous generations have enjoyed. It has been used as a primary point of contact where people naturally congregate. We all know that’s why we have The Queen Vic, The Rovers Return and The Woolpack at the heart of the soaps.

 

Alcohol plays its part, of course, and we are now much more aware of the damage that it can inflict. But the idea of a pint or glass of wine for many people generates positive images, especially when it is aligned with the pub and the prospect of meeting friends. For the vast majority of people, this is seen as a good thing – positively contributing to their well-being.

 

Against this backdrop, it is a shame that alcohol has been almost subsumed by a negative narrative in the media – where it is portrayed as ultimately bad for health and well-being. This has undoubtedly had an eroding impact on the value of the pub. When combined with the ongoing pressures placed upon pubs by the likes of business rates, duty and national insurance contribution changes, it is a very dangerous cocktail.

 

The effects of a visit to the pub – to drink alcohol or not – is, for the bulk of the population, positive for mental health and is life-affirming. This has been recognised by Dave Scholes, founder of the charity Six Connections, which aims to break the stigma and silence over mental health by starting sensitive conversations early, and he sees the pub as a prime territory for getting people together and talking.

 

When I bumped into him at a conference in Manchester recently, he told me: “Our approach is, if we can normalise these conversations among all the other chat we have during the good times, then these tougher conversations will be more accessible. It’s very much the old school community pub approach. My village pub was the model for the idea really. It’s the sense of community and support, even at the most basic level, that I feel is something the pub brings positively into a mental health space.”

 

To promote his cause, he brewed a beer with Moorhouse’s Brewery in Burnley called Ask Twice, which was part of the JD Wetherspoon beer festival last year – with bottles, pump-clips and drip mats all including a QR code linking to a support page.

 

The pub as a conduit for helping with mental health has also been recognised by Portobello Pub Company, which has just transformed its Westow House Pub & Hotel in Crystal Palace into The Brothers’ Arms. For two weeks, the pub is hosting special events and talks related to men’s health, with the underlying remit to “provide a welcoming space for all attendees – not just men”. 

 

Musician Sam Fender has been open about his mental health challenges, and his songs are peppered with references. He recognises the value of the pub and the role it plays in people finding community. In an interview in The Sunday Times last week, he asked: “You just need a good local, don’t you?” Yes, I definitely think so, and I hope increasing numbers of people come to this same conclusion. In addition, there is an opportunity here for pubs to go some way towards reframing the narrative in their favour during these tough times for all.

At the end of last month, the chancellor Rachel Reeves made a speech in Oxfordshire, where she vowed to go “further and faster to kickstart economic growth”. In said speech, she mentioned the word “growth” at least 31 times in the space of 40 minutes. As The Sun’s Ashley Armstrong wrote: “This isn’t the Land of Oz, and chanting the word will not make it miraculously happen!”

 

To rub salt into the wounds, Reeves last week announced 40% business rate relief for the UK film sector, a sector she points out that employs 2.4 million people. As Yummy Group’s Anthony Pender pointed out: “What she should have said was ‘the hospitality industry employs more than 3.2 million people, generates more than £40bn in tax and it’s something the UK is a world leader at, that’s why we are bringing parity to the tax system’, instead of giving global film companies tax breaks, who move profit overseas.”

Quickly followed by William Lees-Jones, managing director of JW Lees, saying: “It’s as though the government does not want UK businesses to be able to compete with overseas investors who will invest in the UK, charge unreasonable amounts of internal interest, repatriate profit to their own countries or more favourable tax regimes and leave UK companies disadvantaged.”

 

Confidence, whether it is business or consumer, is low. Calls to relieve the pain have come in from the likes of Next and Marks & Spencer. Both have called on the chancellor to phase in or stagger the changes to national insurance contributions. Armstrong wrote that Treasury sources told her that isn’t going to happen. The government is now likely to have to make further difficult decisions amid a perfect storm of anaemic economic growth, weaker than expected tax receipts and a strong case for higher defence spending.

There is a cold wind blowing through the sector, and sadly, businesses are only left with straw houses after the past few years of constant challenges. As one sector advisor said to me this week: “The majority will be looking at possible restructuring events again, and who hasn’t looked at making more job cuts?”

 

Jonathan Lawson, chief executive of Butcombe Group, last week said the government needs to take a calmer approach to the tax increases the sector is set to deal with and look at some “pragmatic, common sense solutions”. He called the current environment “unrelenting”. He said: “I mean, as a business, it’s frustrating because we’re doing really well. We had a great year last year. We grew sales strongly. We invested in the business. We’ve invested for the last five or six years with the support of our investor, and we want to continue doing that.

“It is almost like a perfect storm at the moment, because the inflationary pressures put pressure on a business, such as ours, potentially to put up prices, which we don’t really want to be doing at this point in time. You then see a further pressure on pay growth, and it becomes a slightly virtuous circle there of rising prices putting pressure on people to demand higher pay growth. And what we see then is higher inflation. And with all of that, the Bank of England will look at that and feel the environment is not right to bring interest rates down more quickly.

 

“I think consumer confidence is incredibly low, and we've seen that deteriorate quite markedly in the second half of last year, and even where we've been producing strong sales, the actual consumer confidence index that we track is very low. And I think even those consumers that are in a position where they do have disposable income are feeling quite anxious and nervous about that. And for us, confidence is key. We are a discretionary spend. Going to our fantastic pubs for a lovely meal or a drink or a meeting up with friends, it's all discretionary, and that's very much linked to your confidence as a consumer.

“So that's really struggling at the moment and very low, and something we are looking for the government to take steps to improve both consumer confidence and business confidence, because we want to invest. The government talks about a growth agenda – well we would support that, but we’ve seen little evidence from the government so far.” And how will the confidence and stability be impacted by the new US president’s thoughts on trading tariffs and Ukraine? As Lawson said: “I think all of us read those headlines and statements, and whether we are in businesses directly impacted or not, it still doesn’t assist us in terms of the overall confidence with the feeling to invest into a business.”

 

So, is the UK hospitality sector currently uninvestable? As serial sector investor Luke Johnson told me: “I have plenty of dry powder – hospitality is the sector I know and love – but does it even begin to make economic sense to deploy capital in the space given all the challenges? As ever, it depends on the quality of the opportunity, people, brand and so forth. But it is not an easy bet, for sure.” There is a sense that investors focused on turnaround opportunities will be focused on the summer months and the fallout from the measures in the Budget taking effect. As has been the case before over the past few years, there are numerous good businesses which are now over-leveraged, with sites that were once good profit makers but have since become marginal.

 

Over the festive period, I watched the 1958 Spencer Tracey film – The Old Man and The Sea, based on the book by Ernest Hemingway. Tracey plays the Cuban fisherman who has gone 84 days without a catch. On the Old Man's 85th day out, he finally hooks a huge marlin, which he then tries to haul in from far out past shore. For three days and nights he battles the fish, which is portrayed in the film as a trial of mental and physical courage that becomes the ultimate test for him of his worth as a man. I thought then, and even more so now, that it reminded me in part of the battle sector operators have faced over the post covid years. Protecting, building and evolving businesses against the odds.

Sadly, after the struggle, the fish caught, it ended up a carcass, as sharks and other predators nibbled at it on its journey back to shore tied to the side of the boat. I hope that those businesses, which have been so strongly fought for, don't go the same way. Sadly, the way the government is going about things, I fear some have already. Perhaps it would be better to take some consolation from another line from Hemmingway’s book – now is no time to think of what you do not have. Think of what you can do with what there is. 

 

Spoiler alert for those of you who haven’t looked at the news lately. We live in an increasingly dangerous and divided world. There might seem to be little you can do about this, beyond despair. But it strikes me that hospitality has an important part to play in offering hope, a little light and warmth.

 

When you start thinking human beings must be a thoroughly bad lot, an hour or two down the pub can lift the gloom by bringing people together. For a moment, we are all equal in the eyes of the bar staff, and a generosity of spirit prevails. Conviviality is the modest word for it.

 

But I don’t want to romanticise it. In the past, pubs have certainly been places of division. Multi-bar sites are coveted for their character today, but originally, they reflected the class divisions outside their doors. I remember when a pint was dearer in the saloon than in the public bar. And while surviving “snob screens” are a quaint architectural relic, they too tell a story of division.

 

David Jesudason has lately exposed a history of the 20th century in which pubs habitually operated a colour bar, and Pete Brown’s brilliant book Clubland includes the shocking truth that working men’s clubs discriminated against women until 2007. And gay bars wouldn’t have sprung up if other bars were safe for all sexualities. 

 

So, there is nothing innately hospitable about hospitality. It’s something that has had to be fought for – and that fight never really ends. But right now – and hopefully I won’t be proved complacent – it’s proper for the industry, or most of it, to feel proud about where we’ve reached.

 

At a time when certain technology companies in the States are ditching their policies on D&I (diversity and inclusion, sometimes supplemented by an “E” for equity), the hospitality sector here continues to refine and expand its approach. 

 

It was great to find in a Propel mailing the other day a guide produced by the Licensed Trade Charity (LTC) titled Empowering Neurodiversity in the Workplace. This is a tricky area. Neurodivergent people aren’t always visible. Many can cope fine without having to identify as different. Yet while saying that “we’re all on the spectrum” has some truth in it, that can obscure the need for recognition and support for those who need it.

 

The LTC’s strongest point is that hospitality offers a wide variety of jobs at all skill levels and is especially adaptable to what might be described as “different ways of thinking”. It’s about finding the right role for the right person – and when you think about it, that’s true for the “neurotypical” too. Should you believe those characters exist.

 

There was a 1970s sitcom called Robin’s Nest, set in a small restaurant that employed a one-armed washer-upper called Albert Riddle. With hilarious consequences. The joke relies on a misrepresentation of what is now called D&I (a misrepresentation recently voiced by the US president). Inclusivity in employment is specifically about giving people work they can perform well and feel a sense of achievement about.

 

You also have to be prepared to be surprised by what this might mean. I know of a couple of people with Down’s Syndrome who are great at working front-of-house, engaging with customers, and a bar manager with cerebral palsy who jokes about spilling pints, but never does.

 

Although, of course, they’re not all the same, neurodivergent people can possess great powers of concentration, and the kind of attention to detail that makes a good venue great. You’re not doing them a favour by employing them, they can genuinely contribute to your success.

 

More than that, your team is a part of the local community. Customers need to feel the people behind the bar, in the kitchen and waiting tables are one of them, and if your team reflects the diversity out there in the streets, it’s good for broadening your audience and building loyalty to your establishment.

 

And, to take an even wider perspective, D&I is an important element of hospitality’s claims to be a vital part of a healthy society, not simply by bringing conviviality, but by demonstrating the potential for human beings to embrace their differences while having a good time.

 

Now I’ve written that, I feel I might be asking too much of a pie and a pint down the pub. Hospitality can’t solve all the world’s problems, but it can make people – and that means everyone – feel a little better about things.