Hospitality businesses must be granted rent forgiveness for periods they were shut during the lockdown periods or else the sector will see a wave of closures, trade bodies have warned.
In a Treasury Select Committee hearing, representatives from the travel, hospitality and retail sector said recovery from the easing of restrictions would not be sufficient to cover an estimated £5bn in overdue rent accrued during lockdowns.
A moratorium on commercial rents end of 1 July and UK Hospitality boss Kate Nicholls said a third of its members expect to receive rent demand as soon as the deadline passes, even if some remain shut.
“We have a very real problem on our hands if the moratorium is lifted without a resolution being put in place,” said Nicholls.
Helen Dickinson, head of the British Retail Consortium, said: “Here we are two weeks out from when the deadline is going to crystallise and we still don’t know what’s going to happen.”
Nicholls wants the government to endorse a scheme that will see landlords forgive up to 50% of pandemic debts, while Mark Tanzer, chief executive of travel trade body ABTA, wants a grant support scheme similar to those in place in the Netherlands and France that can mean up to 100% of revenues are covered.
The Restaurant Group PLC (LON:RTN), meanwhile said today that in the five weeks since outdoor dining was allowed at restaurants, Wagamama has seen its sites trade at around 85% of the sales levels seen in the same period of 2019, which the company claimed was roughly 15% better than the market as a whole.
Shares in RTN rose by 1.5% to 131.8p.