17th May 2023
Hospitality vacancies fell by almost a quarter over 12 months but “remain stubbornly high”, said UKHospitality. Latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show vacancies in the sector fell by 22% over the last year, and by 9% in the last quarter.
But they remain at 132,000, which is still 48% higher than pre-covid levels. UKHospitality chief executive Kate Nicholls said: “The drop in hospitality vacancies over the past year is testament to the huge effort the sector is putting in to develop our own talent and help people back into the labour market, such as investing in skills and creating more flexible working patterns.
While a 22% drop over the past year is significant, it remains the case that vacancies remain stubbornly high and way in excess of pre-covid levels. We continue to hear that worker shortages are forcing venues to reduce opening hours or trading days, demonstrating that vacancies are not reducing quickly enough to fulfil hospitality’s enormous potential.”
Nicholls called for the government to add more hospitality roles on to its shortage occupation list and will be making the case for this as part of the migration advisory committee’s review. Last month, sector recruitment initiative Hospitality Rising revealed it had attracted more than 100,000 job applications, less than six months after its official launch to tackle the sector’s high number of job vacancies.