Can someone cook up some hospitality staff for Britain?

On Monday, Britain’s restaurants and bars can serve indoors again for the first time in five months. Many of them are struggling to find enough staff after Brexit and three lockdowns in a year drove workers out of the industry.

Chefs, waiters and bartenders needed for everything from fast-food restaurants to fine dining are in short supply, with industry executives and recruiters saying many of their most experienced people have left for other jobs.

“The people just aren’t there any more,” said David Moore, owner of Pied à Terre, London’s longest-standing independent Michelin-starred restaurant. The industry is facing a “fairly massive, very serious skills shortage”.

It’s a sign of scars on the UK economy that may hold back a rebound from the worst recession in three centuries or be a spark for inflation that’s already starting to concern investors. It’s a trend that has hit the US, prompting McDonald’s and others to raise wages for staff.

In Britain, hospitality companies were among the hardest hit by rules that closed leisure venues and pushed workers onto the government’s furlough wage subsidy programme.

Despite that lifeline, the industry shed 330,000 staff through the pandemic, said Kate Nicholls, CEO of lobby group UKHospitality. About 20% of all restaurants and 10% of hotels closed for good and many workers are looking at the long hours, low pay and shaky prospects of hospitality and seeking work elsewhere.

“People are still nervous about committing to hospitality, fearful the government may still impose restrictions and businesses will be unable to offer full-time posts,” Nicholls said. “The single biggest driver is uncertainty.”

Pub and restaurant stocks have rallied hard this year, but despite the UK’s speedy vaccination rollout, most hospitality companies are still trading below pre-Covid-19 levels and hope to get a lift from the return of consumers ready to spend their savings.

What’s happened in this pandemic is they have gone to do other roles, realising they can earn the same or more money standing in a car park or delivering for Amazon or Ocado. It’s a much more pleasant experience. They do fewer hours. They do sociable hours.

—  Former chef Thomas Faulkner

Staffing is one of the industry’s biggest uncertainties. Online job advertisements for “catering and hospitality” rose above pre-pandemic levels in the first week of May, the search engine Adzuna said. A survey of 1,000 companies published recently by the CIPD, a group representing human resources workers, showed two thirds of hospitality companies plan to recruit in the second quarter, up from 36% in the first.

Thomas Faulkner, a former chef who now recruits for the trade, sees a “critical shortage” of staff likely to linger for some time unless restaurants deliver more incentives.

High turnover due to tough working conditions, high pressure, low pay and a “culture of machismo” meant London was losing skilled chefs faster than they could be trained even before Covid-19 struck, according to a report published by the Centre for London.

“Being a chef is generally not healthy,” said Faulkner.

“What’s happened in this pandemic is they have gone to do other roles, realising they can earn the same or more money standing in a car park or delivering for Amazon or Ocado. It’s a much more pleasant experience. They do fewer hours. They do sociable hours,” he said. 

Britain’s exit from the EU, which was completed in January, dried up a big pool of labour. More than 50,000 migrants left the UK in the second quarter of 2020, according to government estimates, with many more expected to follow over the rest of the year. Immigration rules makes it difficult for them to return.

Before Brexit, up to a quarter of the hospitality workforce nationwide and 38% in London was made up by EU nationals, according to KPMG.

— Bloomberg News. For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com