'TV and cheap booze' blamed for landlord quitting

• Published

Former pub landlord Patrick Hughes is blunt when explaining why he has called time on his tenure behind the bar.

"I thought there was a gap in the market but there was no market for the gap", he said.

The 66-year-old took over The Royal Mail Cart pub in Spalding, in August 2025, hoping to attract customers with live music nights and "a sense of community".

Just over a year on he is packing boxes and looking around the empty rooms after he quit his tenancy with the pub's owner, Stonegate Group.

The government said it was supporting pubs with business rates discounts.

Patrick told BBC Politics North that he blames a perfect storm of rising utility and wage prices, people's changing habits and major roadworks directly outside the pub, which began in the summer.

"These days people are used to staying at home, watching TV, having cheap drink from the supermarket or off licence and getting food deliveries," he said.

"To make a pub like this work you need to turn over £12,000 a week, some weeks we were doing quite well, around £8,000, but once the road works began outside that went down quite dramatically."

Figures from the Office for National Statistics, external show that 27% of pubs and bars in Lincolnshire closed between 2009 and 2025. That is a drop from 710 to 515.

In South Holland, of which Spalding is a part, the rate is almost double that, at 53%, a drop from 75 to 35. That is also way above the England average of 19%.

"The government needs to look at the low cost of alcohol in supermarkets primarily," said Patrick.

"Certainly the taxation in supermarkets needs to be looked at to bring about some kind of equilibrium."

Duty paid on draught alcohol in pubs and bars is up to 11 pence cheaper than that sold in supermarkets.

But other costs associated with running a business still makes supermarket alcohol cheaper overall.

Prime Minister Andy Burnham has announced a 20% cut in business rates for qualifying pubs, social clubs and live music venues in England, effective from April 2027.

Emma McClarkin OBE, chief executive of the British Beer and Pub Association, says they want that to be made permanent at the Budget this month, "alongside a freeze in beer duty and a widening of the draft discount".

"We're set to lose one pub a day by the end of the year and 295 have closed already," she said.

"When a pub does close, it's not just the front door that's closing, it's the heritage, the culture, the economic contribution to society and the social value."

Just outside Spalding, The Ship Inn pub stands by the River Welland in the small hamlet of Surfleet Seas End.

"There used to be tables and chairs with people eating food and drinking by the river," said Mark Newlands, who lives a few doors down.

The pub closed last year but now some locals, led by Mark, have formed The Shipmates group to try to raise £600,000 to buy and run it.

So far they have managed to get the pub listed as An Asset of Community Value under the Localism Act 2011. That gives them the right to bid for the property, if it goes up for sale.

"People have become fed up of the Covid way of living and they want to see their pub open," said Mark.

"The indications from smaller and larger investors is that it's worth doing and we've proven to our own satisfaction that it is a viable business."

An HM Treasury spokesperson said: "The Chancellor prioritised support for the hospitality industry in his first week in the job when he cut business rates by 20% for pubs, social clubs and live music venues - saving thousands of locals over £1,000 a year."

Stonegate has been approached by the BBC for comment.

Listen to highlights from Lincolnshire on BBC Sounds, watch the latest episode of Look North.

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