They U-turned on that fairly quickly and continued paying their staff under the furlough scheme rather than waiting to receive the government funding.
Only after media reports and public pressure. They then immediately went on to try and rip off small firms who supply them.
I'm not arguing for a boycott of Wetherspoon, but one has to admit that their employment opportunities couldn't be described as high quality. Better than SSP is about the best that could be said for them. What I'm told they are extremely masterful at however is negotiating rent down, much more so than firms like SSP who have contributed to the build up of an ecosystem in station retailing where everyone must charge extraordinarily high prices because the rent is so high. Rumour has it that at Manchester Piccadilly the former unit that housed the Bread Box was retired simply to push up the rents of the others - that one was a very cheap outlet taking revenue away from other coffee shops. Today the place where it was is occupied by three vending machines dispensing face masks and hand sanitiser at extortionate prices.
If the market re-set to a degree by this, though brutal for all involved, it could result in much improved range and quality of products in station retail.