Ubiquitous Chip, Stravaigin and Hanoi Bike Shop boss slams Glasgow lockdown announcement

Colin Clydesdale, who is the co-owner of The Ubiquitous Chip, Stravaigin and Hanoi Bike Shop, told how restaurant, cafe and bar owners cannot be expected to keep up with constantly changing restrictions. 

Speaking during Lunchtime Live on BBC Radio Scotland this afternoon, Mr Clydesdale revealed that his own businesses will suffer from the news brought from Ms Sturgeon today. Colin Clydesdale and Carol Wright, owners of The Ubiquitous Chip

He said: "We are not in a good place. To put you in the picture, quarter to five last Friday we got the news that we wouldn’t be moving into a tier we would much rather have been in.

"We have spent three days phoning 700 people who were all booked in for tomorrow (Saturday, May 22). It took three people, three days to apologise, trying to stay positive while doing it.

"How long can you expect businesses to limp along in a loss-making situation before they all start to fold? It just doesn’t make any sense."

Mr Clydesdale added that the cost of closing and reopening his eateries in accordance with Scottish Government guidelines has cost him tens of thousands of pounds.

"Every time we’ve been closed [The Chip] we reckon it’s cost between £10,000 and £12,000 to close down, and between £6,000 to £8,000 to reopen – we’ve done it three times so far", he said. 

Hanoi Bike Shop

He also said the number of lockdowns have had an "enormous" effect on staff. 

"We don’t have the hours for them. We’ve managed to keep just about all of them all the way through this," he added. 

"We were gearing up for a sense of normality, and we don’t know what we tell the staff now, we really don’t. We can’t second guess it because the rug may be pulled out with 15 minutes' notice." 

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon announced today that Glasgow will remain in Level 3 of the Covid restrictions system for at least another week. 

Despite higher rates of the virus among the East Renfrewshire population, the neighbouring council area will remain under more relaxed restrictions. 

Ms Sturgeon said that because of the lower numbers of cases in East Renfrewshire, the Government had taken the decision to keep the local authority in level two. 

The SNP leader said that she "could not promise" the Glasgow lockdown would be only one week but said it would be reviewed in seven days.