Jason Atherton: Restaurateurs ‘left waiting like plonkers’ for details on Brexit

The chef hopes ‘the heart doesn’t get ripped out’ of London’s dining scene
“Silly vote”: chef Jason Atherton urged Theresa May to reveal “how things will work”, particularly for staff from EU
Ben Norum10 February 2017

Leading chef and restaurateur Jason Atherton has called for decisiveness over Brexit to allow London’s restaurant scene time to adapt.

Atherton appealed to Theresa May to set out her plan as soon as possible, saying: “Until [the Prime Minister] announces how things will work, we are all just sitting here like plonkers waiting. The faster she does it, the better for us all as it means we can start to work out contingency plans.”

Atherton, who voted Remain in the EU referendum last June, was speaking before the launch today of his ninth London restaurant — a New York-style Italian in Victoria named Hai Cenato which will serve pizza and pasta as well as grilled meat and fish.

The father of two, who now runs nine restaurants in the capital and has Michelin stars at three of them, admitted that the new site would be less affected by Brexit than many Italian restaurants as it will not be entirely traditional and will use British produce rather than importing from Italy.

However, he voiced fears about the effect the vote could have on the whole restaurant industry. “I am not one for being overly negative, this is where we are and we need to make it work,” he said. “But Brexit will undoubtedly have a negative impact on our workforce as the vast majority of workers in the industry are from the EU, there is no getting away from that.

“I hope and pray that the heart doesn’t get ripped out of London’s dining scene. The industry has worked so hard over the past 25 years to turn London’s restaurant scene from a joke into a world leader.

“We have so much talent here and I hope we don’t drive that away for the sake of a silly vote.”

Find out more about Jason Atherton’s new restaurant Hai Cenato, and read our review of his recent opening Temple & Sons.

Visit standard.co.uk/restaurants for the latest news and reviews from London’s food scene.

Follow Ben Norum on Twitter @BenNorum

Follow Going Out on Facebook and on Twitter @ESgoingou

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in