Hospitality sector facing into ‘very bleak’ winter

(Above) Mullingar hotelier Berty Dunne.

The future for the hospitality sector in Westmeath and the rest of the country looks “very bleak” until a vaccine for Covid-19 is found, a Mullingar hotelier says.

Speaking to the Westmeath Examiner this week about the difficulties that hotels, bar and restaurants face as the world learns to live with the coronavirus, Berty Dunne of the Annebrook Hotel said that while most people were holidaying in Ireland this summer, many hotels were operating at significantly reduced capacity.

He also noted that to properly adhere to the Covid-19 guidelines for the sector, especially the more stringent hygiene practices, staffing levels have to remain relatively high.

“We'd have been running at about 50 per cent trade as to what it would have been normal. The figures are way lower in September because all of the weddings are postponed and the accommodation that comes with that isn't going to happen.”

The Annebrook has established itself as one of the most popular wedding venues in the midlands. Scores of couples scheduled to have their wedding receptions their this year have been forced to postpone.

“We'd be very worried with no weddings and no parties taking place.

“Fifty is the limit for weddings and when you include the staff in the room that brings it down to 42 because we would need eight staff between bar and floor staff.

“That's not a proposition and the new regulations around weddings that you have to wear a face mask on the dance floor has completely put all couples off. I don't see any weddings happening until such time that we are in stage four and numbers at indoor events go up to at least 100.

“Most have postponed until 2021 but again I don't see 2021 happening either as finding a vaccine looks a long way away.

“If there was one found by early 2021, it would probably take a year or two to roll out,” Mr Dunne said.

With the landscape “looking very bleak”, Mr Dunne believes that the government needs to provide more supports for the sector – starting with a major reduction in VAT.

The UK government recently announced that it was cutting VAT on hospitality services from 20% to 5%. Mr Dunne says that our government should do the same and slash the current VAT rate of 13.5%.

“It was a huge help to the sector in the UK and I think that we should follow suit. The VAT is a huge issue and it would mean that we could possibly offer weekend packages to people at a lower rate to encourage them to visit from now until Christmas,” he said.