The Surrey Board of Trade is a part of the BC Covid Industry Engagement Table and was a part of the pre-briefing this morning with Dr. Bonnie Henry and BC’s Economic Development Minister Ravi Kahlon.
Today, the BC Government announced extensive restrictions due to the new Omicron Covid variant. These restrictions will come into effect Wednesday, December 22 at 11:59 pm.
“The majority of businesses have been compliant throughout the pandemic and have not received the timely support that has been advocated for,” said Anita Huberman, President & CEO of the Surrey Board of Trade. “These restrictions come from the provincial government, but we need both the federal and provincial governments to immediately implement business supports that are easily accessible such as the wage subsidy program.”
The BC Government recommends people limit social interactions.
New restrictions and measures include:
1. Expanding capacity to test those people who need to be tested and rapid tests that they have into health care systems.
2. Increasing resilience by ramping booster dose program.
3. Stop all non-urgent surgeries until January 4th.
4. Keeping capacity limits on personal gatherings to 10 maximum.
5. As of Wednesday night December 22, canceling all organized events, parties, celebrations including at banquet halls, restaurants, hotels.
6. Closing bars and nightclubs – not pubs, cafes, tasting rooms, restaurants.
7. 50% capacity limit for seating theatre, concerts, casinos – masking enforced/vaccine card reader enforced.
8. Restaurants will remain open. Limiting to 6 people per table. Restaurants need to put in barriers.
9. Gyms, Fitness Centres, Dance Studios – need to provide services outdoors/online.
These new measures will be in place until January 18.
When initial lockdown measures were announced in early 2020, it took months to implement support systems.
“In order to preserve some sort of economic certainty, governments must concurrently roll out business support measures when new restrictions are announced.”
