Eight in 10 restaurant businesses are currently understaffed, the Restaurant Association says. Photo / Babiche Martens.
Hospitality staffing may be at a “crisis point” ahead of the Christmas period.
With borders open and Covid restrictions removed, restaurants are seeing increased demand this year but are struggling to keep up.
Restaurant Association chief executive Marisa Bidois said, “It’s more important than ever that hospitality is able to operate at full capacity.
“Unfortunately staffing levels are at crisis point with businesses unable to access the labour they need.”
The Restaurant Association’s December 2022 member survey found 80 per cent of restaurants were not fully staffed.
“Many of our members are streamlining their menus and in some cases reducing their operating hours to compensate for the lack of staff,” Bidois said.
Social Development and Employment Minister Carmel Sepuloni said the Ministry of Social Development “is aware and actively working to alleviate the impacts on small businesses”.
Go To Collection co-founder Fleur Caulton said the situation comes down to understaffing due to a lack of overseas workers.
Malaysian cuisine specialists Bunga Raya said finding the right staff has been their biggest challenge.
Co-owner John Lim said demand for the business is “getting there”, returning almost “back to normal” post-Covid.
He said finding specialist staff now depends on obtaining a licence to hire overseas workers while managing ongoing operational costs.
“Getting the right people for the right job, the requirements of what I need is hard at the moment, so I’ve got to source it from overseas.”
He says these additional costs mean making a decent living is a thing of the past.
“These are all the new costs coming in. And then of course, the cost of goods have gone up. Everything is double. The cost of food is all doubled now for us to produce the same thing as before Covid.”
Café Hanoi and Ghost Street owner Krishna Botica said the demand for staff is “tenuous but manageable”.
“Availability for New Zealanders is patchy over summer. These are students, not full-time workers.”
Sepuloni said MSD is working to attract school leavers to enter the hospitality sector through their partner My Mahi and are exploring options on a joint campaign to promote hospitality as a career option for New Zealanders.
“From an engagement survey, 236 young people have said their preference is to work with food and drink.”
Sepuloni added, “Now that borders have reopened and international hotel chains are recovering, MSD is looking to reinstitute partnerships with international hotel chains for training and employment.”
Botica said hospitality businesses are doing “everything and anything in attempts to hire staff”, including searching social media.
“Pay rates are extremely volatile and tricky to manage … Staff are requesting outrageous pay and have very little experience.”
Lim said “it’s still hard to get the proper staff” from overseas, which has led to different proprietors “stealing” staff from each other by offering better pay to specialist chefs.
“We are literally stealing from each other. We are at the mercy of the employee.”
He said the Government’s priority is to allow migrant workers into agriculture which doesn’t help small businesses.
“Perhaps the Government can open up certain industries if they listen to which industry is short. Then the playing field is even.”
Immigration Minister Michael Wood and Tourism Minister Stuart Nash said in November, “Overseas visitor numbers for the month of September showed a significant uptick, while a decline in the net migration loss shows more people are choosing to stay in New Zealand.”
Botica said businesses are “being forced into the situation because of long waits on visa processing.”
Bidois said, “One of the biggest issues based on member feedback is the current immigration settings making it increasingly challenging for our members to access the workforce they need.”
“Over 17,000 working holiday visitors have now arrived in country, out of the 36,000 approved since March, providing much need labour during a time of global shortage,” Wood said.
“Since the beginning of November, we have seen weekly arrivals of over 1200 visa holders. Monthly arrivals have built, from 1000 in July to over 4000 in October.
“Our government recognises the crucial part working holiday visa holders play in the New Zealand economy. We need their skills here to meet demand in industries like tourism, hospitality, agriculture, horticulture.”
Feedback from Restaurant Association members in July showed 78 per cent of businesses recruiting staff received fewer than five responses for job ads.
The demand for services in Auckland however can’t compare with last year, Botica said.
“The borders are open. We have corporate travel and tourists. If we weren’t open, we would be in serious trouble. We’re in a lot of debt.”
Botica said most restaurants are “in a lot of debt to IRD or the bank” and that “most of us are in debt to both”.
“We’re finding out every week how things will go for January.”
She added that Covid-19 complicates staff shortages.
“For industries like ours, you can’t work from home. There’s a number of industries that are hamstrung by isolation periods.”
Sepuloni said “MSD have put together a number of initiatives to support the sector [to] meet its labour needs,” including the Flexi Wage scheme in the hospitality sector, the Hospo Start programme, and through their partnerships with the industry.
“Our Industry Partnerships team have supported the hospitality industry through Skills For Industry, and programmes like the Hospo Start programme to support the Restaurant Association and Hospitality New Zealand to assist employers to find people with the right skill set to work in the industry.”
She said, “The programmes are designed to support the retention of staff by upskilling them during the Covid-19 lockdown period. The flow-on effect would enable those staff to move into higher paid positions with their employer and within the sector, allowing entry-level opportunities to become available when the sector reopened.”
Lim said his current staff are experiencing a higher rate of sickness which stops them from being able to work.
He said workers must take time off “not for Covid” but that “staff are slowly getting sick”.
Two months ago, his two chefs contracted Covid at the same time resulting in a week-long closure for Bunga Raya.
“I’ve got to close the whole place up, so that’s like my own lockdown, but we get by.”
Lim said the Government’s focus on highly skilled workers is also a worry for the industry.
“I’m not a tech company … I want chefs. Proper, good chefs to come in.
“They are not pen-pushers, I don’t need a qualification. I need what they know and what they cook.”
Economic recovery is coming but won't solve structural problems.