The furlough scheme has ended and Chancellor Rishi Sunak hasn’t ruled out rising unemployment in the UK. He told Sky News that the government is "throwing the kitchen sink" at helping people find new roles and learn new skills.
He further said, "But what I do know is that the interventions we put in place have made an enormous difference. I think the plan is working. Now of course some people have sadly lost their jobs and will lose their job.
But that's why I want them to be reassured that we are throwing literally the kitchen sink at helping them get a new job, new skills, new opportunities and we know that's been working over the past 12 to 18 months and that's why we're doing more of it today."
Asian Voice reached out to Asian businesses to get a sense of their plan b for a rainy day if in case there are further job losses, staff shortages or even another pandemic like calamity.
Indian hotelier and founder of Speciality Restaurants Limited, Anjan Chatterjee told Asian Voice that the majority of his staff for his restaurant Chourangi in London will be hired locally.
While Britain continues to grapple with staff shortage, and understandably skilled labour, Chatterjee added, “Our head chefs have been selected from Oh! Calcutta, our restaurant in Kolkata.”
When asked how long he thinks he’ll be able to suffice amid several kinds of shortages in the UK, Mr Chattejree said, “While getting the right quality of staff has been challenging, but due to Speciality Restaurant’s longstanding credibility, we have been able to attract the right talent. As of the present we have not faced any food shortage but I am sure that the UK government will handle this in an appropriate manner so that the restaurant or F&B industry is not impacted.”
How are Asian businesses surviving amid food, staff, fuel shortages? Sanjay Aggarwal, co-founder and director of Spice Kitchen told us, “We can only speak for our business, but for us, the planning we have done to ensure that we are as flexible and agile as possible as a business means we are doing ok. We ensure all staff are multi-skilled and trained so that if anyone is off sick, particularly with Covid, we can all step in and support the overall operation. This all hands-on deck approach is certainly a huge factor in our ability to ride the current waves.
“We are offering staff flexibility to work from home if they can, and everyone is set up with a workstation both in the office and at home should they need to switch quickly. For those staff who have to be in the office to do their jobs, we have implemented car-sharing and have even paid for public transport for some team members during the fuel shortages.”
Spice Kitchen has a team of 16 people and around 25% are Asian. “Luckily for us, the staff we need are available right now, as we predominantly require warehouse/packing staff. We've been fortunate enough to take advantage of the government's Kickstart programme. We now have eight employees on kickstart placements, and they are all excellent: the whole scheme has been brilliant, and we are pleased to see an extension in yesterday's news,” Sanjay said.
Since the pandemic has established that no business or individual can take their set-up/job for granted, we asked Sanjay if he as a business owner, has thought of a Plan B or contingency plan should any other future pandemic or calamity hit us. He said, “The apprentice employer support grant is excellent, and we are looking to convert some of the staff from kickstart to apprenticeships once they finish their six months. This helps us with our longer-term planning and will hopefully give us resilience in terms of any future issues, such as a pandemic.”
Industry body The City UK, an industry body, has meanwhile called for the introduction of a short-term business visa to allow staff to work in Britain for up to six months without the red tape needed for a full work visa. The body also said that nine months on from the introduction of Britain's post-Brexit immigration system, financial and professional services firms were seeing "significant cost increases to securing the high-skilled talent that they need to compete on the global stage".
In a joint report with Ernst and Young and London Corporation, City UK said, "While real progress has been made in removing unnecessary barriers and expanding the immigration routes available to skilled talent, businesses continue to struggle with process-related issues. In many cases, relatively minor tweaks to the UK's current mobility framework could go a long way to help UK businesses access the highly-skilled international talent they need to grow and compete globally."
There is also less respite for families as cCouncil tax will soar over next three years - adding £500 to average yearly bills, Daily Mail reported.
Britain needs an extra £8bn to keep social care services at the same quality as a present which is because the UK has a large ageing population that means more will need social care.
“Such an increase would see the average band D council tax bill in England soar from the present £1,898 to £2,372 – a rise of £474. The recently-announced rise in national insurance will cost those on £50,000 a year an extra £500 annually while rising inflation, the end of the stamp duty holiday and the £20a--week universal credit boost all mean bad news for personal finances,” Sky reported.
