MP Tony Piccolo launches attack on Steven Marshall over handling of the pandemic

Struggling suburban cafes in Omicron recovery mode have been stonewalled by staff shortages and cautious customers with the local MP laying blame on the Premier.

Light MP Tony Piccolo, has accused Premier Steven Marshall of decimating cafes in his electorate as business owners report staff lay-offs and customers choosing to stay home due to the Covid crisis.

The Labor MP hosted a ‘cafe crawl’ in his electorate, encompassing Gawler, Evanston, Hewitt and Munno Para, where he met with business owners to hear their concerns.

Light MP Tony Piccolo with Jason Assender, owner of the Gawler South Bakery. The cafe has been vigilant about Covid outbreaks. Picture: Facebook

“What we have here are businesses doing it tough for a range of reasons, one of which being, staff needing to isolate if they have Covid or are a close contact,” Mr Piccolo said.

“Many of these small businesses, if they lose a staff member, that’s it, they’ve either got to close their businesses or they’re struggling.”

Mr Piccolo question why SA was the only state where close contacts and positive cases needed to isolate for 10 days under SA Health guidelines.

He said cafe owners had also reported customers being “too scared to leave the house” because of Omicron and density limits – capped at 50 per cent capacity indoors and 75 per cent outdoors – causing a huge drop in sales.

“He’s destroying people’s lives. Steven Marshall said the state was ready when the borders reopened on November 23 and we have found that’s simply not the case,” Mr Piccolo said.

“He needs to wear that – he needs to cop to it.”

Premier Steven Marshall, who is the subject of the stinging attack by the Labor MP for Light. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dean Martin

David Knibbs, owner of Gawler cafe Coffee on Jacob, met with Mr Piccolo.

He said the last few months had been ‘very ordinary’ for his business.

“A lot of people are just not coming out, we haven’t seen some of our old regulars return,” Mr Knibbs said.

“I used to have about 20 people inside and now because of density limits that’s been restricted to five maybe six people.”

Member for Light Tony Piccolo has accused Premier Steven Marshall of mishandling the Covid pandemic and affecting businesses in his electorate. Picture: Facebook

The density limits became such an issue for Mr Knibbs that he had to temporarily let go of one of his staff members for over a month, leaving only Mr Knibbs and his son to keep the business afloat.

At Gawler South Bakery, owner Jason Assender said while his business was doing well despite the circumstances, there was a drop in customers during Covid.

“We’re doing more takeaways than we used to and constantly cleaning the premises,” Mr Assender said.

Mr Assender said there had been no outbreaks at his shop.

He said some staff have had to isolate but it was because they were on holidays or caught Covid outside the workplace.

A spokesperson for the government said the Premier didn’t want to keep restrictions in place “for one day longer than we need to” but that “these restrictions are keeping South Australians safe”.

The spokesperson also said the Marshall government had released eight financial support packages, with the last two totalling $90m.

“These packages have meant thousands of dollars directly into effected businesses’ bank accounts, which includes our regional businesses doing it tough,” the spokesperson said.