Hospitality Today Spring 2017 | Page 14

14 | Hospitality Today | Spring 2017 The Arena Sa Andrew Selley, CEO of Bidfood Now in its 21st year, the Arena Savoy Lecture 2017 took place in March. The ballroom at the Savoy hotel hosted a panel discussion on Brexit, before Andrew Selley (right), the chief executive of Bidfood (formerly Bidvest Foodservice), gave his take on ‘Future Fit Foodservice’. The shape of Brexit The Brexit panel discussion, chaired by the British Hospitality Association’s (BHA) Vernon Hunte, took a look at the challenges and opportunities Brexit presents for foodservice and hospitality. The panellists “helping to clear the muddy waters” were Jason Myers, the CEO of Busaba Eathai, Bob Silk the relationship director of Barclays’ Hospitality & Leisure Team, and Sebastian Calnan, a consultant at EMW Law. The headlines from the debate include: the two-year negotiation period is a tall order and not sufficient time to resolve everything; EU food legislation is likely to be adopted as UK law as the public is generally happy and accepting of it; free movement of people remains an area of concern and needs to be nailed down quickly with a common-sense approach, especially as it could take up to ten years to replace overseas recruitment with