The hospitality industry’s largest employers have hit back at the chief executive of the British Hospitality Association after he claimed that UK workers were “unemployable”.
Speaking at a Parliamentary inquiry into tourism, Bob Cotton suggested that UK workers lacked the motivation to turn up to work each day and were happy to stay on benefits.
He said that hiring Polish staff ahead of local workers was a “no-brainer”, adding that people from central Europe had been the best labour source in the industry for hundreds of years, according to Personnel Today’s sister publication, Caterer & Hotelkeeper.
“If you’re an employer and have a keen person from Poland who is bright, smiling, wants to work, who turns up every day and will work 45 to 50 hours a week against a person who turns up one day, doesn’t turn up the next and isn’t really interested, it’s a no-brainer,” he said.
Grant Hearn, chief executive of Travelodge, called the comments “nothing short of outrageous”.
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