Should Hospitality Have Its Own Ministry? Yes.

Tom Kerridge has called for the Government to create a dedicated Ministry for Hospitality.

And I agree with him.

Because, if I’m honest, I find it quite frustrating that we are still having this conversation.

Hospitality is one of the biggest employers in the country. It supports millions of jobs, contributes billions to the economy and is made up of businesses that are often working on incredibly tight margins.

Yet when decisions are made that directly affect us, we still seem to be spread across different departments, different ministers and different conversations.

Business rates over here. Employment costs over there. Licensing somewhere else.

Planning somewhere else again.

Then you’ve got VAT, National Insurance, apprenticeships, skills, energy costs and everything else that lands on the same business at the end of the month.

That is the bit that frustrates me.

Because when you actually run a hospitality business, none of these things are separate.

They all affect the same P&L.

And sometimes it feels like policies are being made without anyone looking at the full picture.

We don't need special treatment. We need understanding.

I’m not saying hospitality should get everything it asks for.

Of course it shouldn’t.

Every industry has pressures and Government has difficult decisions to make.

But I do think hospitality deserves people in Government who properly understand how the industry works.

People who understand that adding another cost might sound manageable in isolation, but when it lands on top of wage increases, energy bills, food inflation, business rates and National Insurance, it can be the thing that pushes a business too far.

That is why Tom Kerridge’s point makes sense.

A dedicated Ministry for Hospitality would mean there are people whose job is to actually understand the sector before decisions are made.

That shouldn’t really feel like a radical idea.

Hospitality employs around 3.5 million people in the UK.

That is around one in ten jobs.

It contributes roughly £93 billion directly to the economy and generates around £54 billion in tax.

These are not small numbers.

And yet we still seem to spend a lot of our time explaining why the sector matters.

That is the strange bit.

If hospitality was a small industry asking for attention, I could understand it.

But it isn’t.

It is one of the biggest employers in the country, and it has been under serious pressure for years.

The latest figures show that 1,839 licensed venues closed during the second quarter of 2026.

Nearly as many opened, which shows there is still plenty of confidence and ambition in the industry.

But I don’t think we should look at that and say everything is fine.

Hospitality operators are resilient.

We always have been.

We adapt, cut costs, change menus, change opening hours, restructure teams, negotiate with suppliers and somehow find a way through.

But there is only so much adapting a business can do.

At some point, Government has to look at whether the environment it is creating actually allows good businesses to survive.

And that is where having proper hospitality representation could make a difference.

I’ve worked in hospitality for more than 30 years and one thing that has never really changed is how fragmented the conversation around the industry can be.

One department looks at wages. Another looks at tax. Another looks at planning. Another looks at skills.

But nobody seems to sit in the middle and say:

What does all of this actually mean for the operator?

That is the question that matters.

Because a hotel, restaurant or pub does not receive these policies one at a time.

They all land together.

And eventually something gives.

Hospitality is very good at making noise when it needs to.

Industry bodies, operators, chefs and business owners have spent years explaining the same pressures over and over again.

And I think that is where some of my frustration comes from.

We shouldn’t still have to keep explaining that hospitality is a serious industry.

We shouldn’t need another crisis before somebody pays attention.

And we shouldn’t have to wait until more businesses close before Government asks whether something is going wrong.

A dedicated Ministry for Hospitality would not solve every problem.

But at least there would be somebody whose job it is to understand the problems properly.

Someone to connect the dots.

Someone to challenge decisions where necessary.

And someone sitting at the table speaking for an industry that employs millions of people.

So yes, I think hospitality should have its own ministry.

Quite frankly, I think it should have had one a long time ago.