Just under half of small and medium businesses back the Government's approach to lockdowns
Thursday, 22 July 2021
Business owner Regan McFall backs learning to live with Covid-19 and no more lockdowns.
Co-owner of fuel tank design and manufacturing business Fuel Storage, headquartered in Mt Manganui, McFall said he would not support any type of lockdown now.
McFall’s view is a minority one, an MYOB Covid-19 SME Snapshot survey shows.
The country understood more about Covid now than when it first went into lockdown in late March last year, McFall said.
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“It’s not this plague-like deadly virus we all thought it was to begin with. Yes it does kill people but a lot of things kill people.”
“When there’s a virus that comes out that’s killing children and healthy 20-year-olds,then sure.”
McFall, in his early thirties, said he was not anti-vaccination and had had all the ones required when he was young, but he considered the Covid vaccines had not been tested enough and not enough was known about them.
He had deleted all his news feeds with any reference to Covid and had stopped watching news several months ago.
“I have no idea what’s going on in the outside world outside my business and my own personal bubble and my god am I so much happier for it.”
If the Government forced another lockdown a lot more businesses would “go by the wayside” this time, and a lot would refuse to shut down, he said.
Business platform MYOB has surveyed just over 500 small businesses in a Covid-19 SME Snapshot and found just 13 per cent supported keeping the country running as usual and learning to live with the virus if there was a significant community Covid-19 outbreak.
However, one in five, 20 per cent, supported just some restrictions, wanting to keep businesses open but with masks mandated for all gatherings and in public areas like supermarkets and public transport.
Lockdowns were still supported by almost half. Some 17 per cent backed a national lockdown with level 3 or 4 restrictions of unlimited time until the outbreak was contained, and another one-third (32 per cent) of respondents supported localised or region-specific lockdowns.
Holly Ensor, owner of The Flower Bar in Howick, Auckland, backed lockdowns in smaller areas early to contain the spread of the virus.
“I do think moving swiftly into a level 2 or 3 is the right way to go.”
Her business had not been affected much by Covid and thrived in level 2 and 3 because when people could not go out much or see friends and family they tended to send flowers.
But she would be worried about the impact of another lockdown on the community and on her husband’s business.
The MYOB survey revealed that many SME owners did not understand they could not require employees to be vaccinated.
The survey said nearly half planned to require their employees to be vaccinated in order to keep their jobs.
But they cannot do that except in limited circumstances, set out on the Government’s employment website, employment.govt.nz.
The Government’s employment website says businesses “can only require that certain roles are performed by employees who are vaccinated, if the work is covered by a Health Order, or if a risk assessment shows that there is a high risk of getting and/or infecting others with COVID-19. There are very few types of work in New Zealand where this would apply.”
MYOB senior sales manager SME, Krissy Sadler-Bridge, said businesses needed to be clear on what they could do and the Government’s employment website set that out.
”I think the important thing is that businesses have got to be aware that vaccination is actually an individual decision.”
But there were ways they could encourage their employees to be vaccinated such as offering flexible working arrangements, so employees had the time to be vaccinated.
Sadler-Bridge said it was interesting that nearly half of SMEs, 46 per cent, said they would support a short lockdown of seven to 14 days with level 3 and 4 restrictions even though it would put their business under quite a lot or extreme pressure.
Just over a quarter said their business would handle another lockdown with little or no pressure.
Two-thirds of construction businesses and just over half of retail and hospitality business said a lockdown would place their businesses under quite a lot or extreme pressure.
And just over two in five businesses were confident the Government would provide financial support if a lockdown was necessary, like it had done before.