The Isle of Man Licensed Victuallers Association has welcomed the increase in the minimum wage, and believes that the increase is justified at this moment on the Island, contrary to the views of Heron & Brearley.
Chairman of the LVA, Andy Saunders, said that the LVA, which represents the vast majority of the free trade public houses, hotels and eateries, accepted there were issues in the hospitality industry at the moment but said the organisation was committed to working along with the government to try to resolve them.
He said, “We feel that punishing hard working members of staff and diluting the employment pool by paying below par wages is definitely not the solution.
“The people of the Isle of Man working at the lower end of the pay scales are the people who are spending the vast majority of their wages in the Island’s retail and hospitality sector, and we would support those people being helped by government as a priority. This can only help the overall economy.”
The LVA has asked for further dialogue with the Isle of Man Government on improving training schemes, creating apprenticeships and generally making the hospitality industry a more attractive career path for people wishing to work within it.
Mr Saunders added, “There are other ways the government could help us with improving the night-time economy, and as a priority there must be a way to balance the cost difference between safe, supervised and regulated drinking in licensed environments and the home supply market which is leading to health and social problems on our Island, as pointed out by many agencies.
“We were disappointed to hear the views of Heron and Brearley last week regarding the issue and would hasten to point out that the vast majority of the trade do not share them, or indeed pay staff at minimum wage at all.”
He said that Heron & Brearley’s prominence was creating a false impression that all of the industry is committed to low wages. “That’s simply not the case,” said Mr Saunders.
“We would ask Heron and Brearley to consider the real costs to the industry as a whole to rapidly increasing costs, not only to the end consumers but to businesses supplying their products, before initiating another round of price increases to cover the cost of this increase.
“The declining number of pub visitors will not be reversed by a fourth price increase in as many months.”
