Govt fails to provide new roadmap evidence

By Lisa Riley

Published: 18 March, 2021

The government has failed to provide any new evidence as to why indoor hospitality cannot open the same day as non essential retail, according to night-time economy adviser for Greater Manchester, Sacha Lord.

Lord, who instigated legal action against the government over the lack of evidence for delaying reopening of the hospitality industry for five weeks after ‘non-essential’ retail, is now planning to take the case to the High Court for a Judicial Review.

In a tweet posted posted late yesterday afternoon, Lord said: “We've just received the governments response.

“They have failed to introduce any new evidence as to why indoor hospitality cannot open the same day as non essential retail.

“We'll now be working through the night to take our case to the High Court for a Judicial Review.”

Earlier in the day, Lord had tweeted: “The whole legal team now have everything prepped and ready. The government has until the end of today to show us the evidence. Hospitality, with measures in place, should open the same day as non-essential retail.”

Last weekend, Pizza Express investor Hugh Osmond joined Lord in backing his legal action to force a judicial review of the roadmap.

Following the news of the legal challenge, UK Hospitality earlier this week urged the government to review the roadmap, calling on it to “make decisions based on data, not dates”.

Earlier this month, the government launched a review into commercial rents as it extended the moratorium, which was due to expire at the end of this month, by three months.

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