I rarely have opinions on anything other than the temperature of my beer, but as a seasoned chef I was glad last week to see the somewhat underground life of hospitality workers brought into the light: 197 companies were named and shamed by the government for failing to pay their workers the national minimum wage – and of all those companies the expensive London restaurant San Lorenzo, beloved of celebrities and sports people, owed the largest debts: almost £100,000 to 30 employees (all the companies that were named have now paid these back wages).

The current dispute over changes to payments for Deliveroo workers and the protests over Byron’s treatment of its staff have highlighted specific issues in the hospitality industry, and San Lorenzo shows these problems aren’t unique to the middle market. Princess Diana and Sophia Loren may have dined there, but this means very little back of house.

I started in hospitality as a private chef which, along with excellent pay, allows you to decide your own hours. It was only on returning to the UK after a stint in France that my eyes truly opened to what goes on in professional kitchens. I won’t say that everywhere I’ve worked has been horrible, but there have been so many instances that I can’t put them down to chance. As a young chef with a head full of Marco Pierre White quotes and my trusty Larousse Gastronomique under my arm, I was ready for whatever they threw at me – but I didn’t realise it was going to be torrents of abuse, belittlement, sexism and racism.

Abuse in the kitchen isn’t the only problem young chefs face. Pay is another big cause for concern. I once accepted a job with a very highly regarded Michelin-starred chef with what seemed like a decent enough salary, if you worked a 40-hour week. Of course, in the restaurant industry, you never do. When I had finally had enough of the 18-hour days that the four other unfortunate chefs and I were working, we calculated we were taking home roughly £2 an hour. Which doesn’t leave you with much, apart from severe dermatitis, mouth sores from dehydration and lack of sleep, panic attacks and mood swings.

The knock-on effects of long hours, high stress and low pay are a string of related issues: relationship problems, alcoholism, drug addiction and PTSD. So why is the industry so popular? Have the likes of White and Gordon Ramsay made the macho atmosphere seem romantic? Could it be that colleges are still teaching young people this is a lucrative and character-building career that allows you to explore the world? Or is it simply that some jobs will literally take anyone? The answer is all of the above, and then some.

People are drawn into the industry, lured by the illusion that chefs are rugged, pirate-like rebels (as suggested by Anthony Bourdain in his book Kitchen Confidential). This is what attracted me. It wasn’t until I grew up and had a child, and therefore some responsibilities, that I realised wages for jobs in the hospitality industry – even the good ones – don’t pay the bills.

A celebrity Michelin-starred chef may employ a few well-paid chefs; usually the ones they need to keep loyal in order to maintain their own “kitchen structure”. But labouring away beneath these are the overworked, badly paid chefs who rarely moan because they see this as an opportunity to learn amazing techniques (like I’ll ever need to use liquid nitrogen outside a professional kitchen). And beneath these, you have the stagiaires – people basically on unpaid work experience.

The problem is, the job does hook you. Even after everything I have come to learn about this industry, I would still love to be able to “stage” at a restaurant like El Bulli. I’m driven by a passion for food and a lot of the time the adrenaline from a good service would make me forget the money. It was only the harsh reality of life outside the kitchen, the need to make enough money to live, that brought me down to earth, and made me question my own ambitions – I still work as a chef, but outside a restaurant once again. My only hope is to one day have my own restaurant (after all my experiences, I know I would treat my staff well).

But failing that, I will have to do what most people in the industry are doing: look for a new career.

During my time in hospitality I’ve been witness to exploitation, assault and drug and alcohol abuse, to name just a few. Ask any chef in the world for their stories, and they will shock and haunt you. I am fortunate to have escaped restaurant life and I now have a comfortable job that still allows me to be passionate about food, without the nonsense attached to the industry. But there are many who simply can’t escape due to lack of other qualifications or experience, or who retain a glimmer of hope that things will get better. “A union would be nice” was a common refrain in the rain over a cigarette with my co-workers. One thing is certain. If people choose to speak out, I suspect it’ll become clear the San Lorenzo story is far from rare. And the hospitality industry will face a reckoning. We live in hope.