Struggling restaurant industry shut out in provincial budget

Representatives of Saskatchewan’s restaurant industry say the good news about Wednesday’s budget is there aren’t any new tax increases, but the bad news is there isn’t any relief for them.

The restaurant industry throughout Saskatchewan and across Canada has struggled over the past three-plus years as they’ve had to deal with the direct impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Jennifer Henshaw, the vice-president of the prairies and north zones with Restaurants Canada, wishes there was more help coming their way.

“It was a bit of a missed opportunity to address some of the operational challenges the industry is grappling with. We’re seeing minimum wage increases rolling out here in the next year in Saskatchewan and we would’ve liked to see (the government) introduce some mitigating measures in the budget,” Henshaw said.

“We would’ve liked to see them eliminate PST on dine-in restaurant meals now that we’re back in a surplus position. We’d also like to see them level the playing field on wholesale liquor pricing and that didn’t happen. Through our lens, there were a few misses in the budget.”

While inflation is hurting everyone’s wallet, she suggests restaurants are still one of the hardest-hit sectors.

“I think the restaurant sector is grappling with a bit of a perfect storm right now. The industry is, in a way, more of a price taker than a price maker because nobody is going to pay $35 for a hamburger,” she said.

“When you look at the layering effect of skyrocketing inflation on food prices, you look at utilities going up and prices across the board and the labour shortages, you can appreciate some restaurants have had to make pretty tough decisions.”

While some restaurants have been able to whether the storm, Henshaw adds it could only go on for so long.

“The industry is resilient, especially coming out of the pandemic, but I think resiliency will only take you so far,” Henshaw said. “We’ve seen restaurants having to change their menus, change portion sizes (and) increase prices, so there’s been a lot of adjustments for an industry coming out of the pandemic. It’s one of the hardest-hit.”

On a federal level, Henshaw hopes the Canada Emergency Business Account (CEBA) loan deadline is extended to continue to help restaurants get by.

The CEBA program offered interest-free loans of up to $60,000 to small businesses and not-for-profits.