UKHospitality is the voice of a sector that generates £3bn in
Gross Added Value for the Welsh economy each year. UKHospitality
spearheads hospitality’s representation on the strategic,
structural and regulatory issues it faces, campaigning for policies
to help the sector achieve further growth as a key driver of Welsh
economy. These businesses represent 11% of overall employment in
Wales, employing 174,000 people. Hospitality has faced myriad cost
pressures in recent years which have severely impacted the sector
and its potential to grow, yet it continues to play a central role
on Wales’s high streets and in its communities.
Data collection is currently limited as it requires companies to
contribute to surveys which can often lead to low levels of
responses. This is because for some companies there is "survey
fatigue" as the Government and supportive agencies regularly send
out questionnaires to back a wide variety of funded projects. This
is likely to mean SMEs in the hospitality industry will fare
slightly worse in comparison to larger companies where there would
be centralised support for such activity.
UKHospitality believes that our sector is vital to the health of
the economy in Wales. However, generally the sector has not been
represented as well on partnership boards as it should have been
given its economic significance. We would like to see more
engagement by partnerships with the sector.
UKHospitality believes that regional skills partnerships (RSPs) do
have the capacity to reflect and adapt to the demands of their
regions. However, it is important that greater buy in to these
partnerships is created and that the support base is widened to
ensure they are as effective as possible.
UKHospitality supports more engagement with businesses to maximise
the effectiveness of RSPs. More hospitality specialists must be
consulted as currently the sector is disadvantaged in comparison to
other industries where there is institutional support for those
participating.
UKHospitality believes that much greater resource should be
allocated to RSPs. Skills form one of the most vital elements of
all Government activity post Brexit. Therefore, a greater
allocation of resources to RSPs is essential if they are to be
effective.
UKHospitality believes that industry should have more of a say
within this work and feed back to the Welsh Government with what it
has learned from the process. An approach more focused on industry
would be more effective in outlining sector need that one led by
the Government. This is linked to the answer above suggesting that
more hospitality sector experts need to be consulted.
UKHospitality believes that the work of the RSPs and the Welsh
Government have been a positive influence. However, there remains
much work to be done to ensure that skills provision is addressed
appropriately. UKHospitality would be happy to work with the Welsh
Government in the future to address the current issues identified
within this response.
As mentioned above, generally we have seen a positive influence from the work of the Welsh Government and the RSPs. Having an advisory level below government that can directly influence investment and attitudes is a good thing. However, it needs to adequately reflect the collective value of the participants and not only be reflective of those that can afford the time to participate or benefit industries that are structured in a way as to allow greater involvement from their members. The current system does not cater appropriately for the hospitality industry, which is multi-faceted and often SME-led but nonetheless offers huge economic and employment opportunities compared to many others.
There are signs that RSPs are working well but they are still
evolving and are not meeting the specific demands of the
hospitality industry. Currently, they do not yet have enough buy in
from individual businesses and have a reputation for being very
demanding on time.
UKHospitality supports the closer interaction and cooperation between the three RSPs to prevent patchy delivery. We want RSPs to enable genuine, pan Wales industries like hospitality to have a solid platform to achieve skills targets rather than an uneven playing field in certain areas.