Pubs (Planning Policy)

Debate between Greg Mulholland and Julian Sturdy

Wednesday 16th February 2011 Westminster Hall

[Greg Mulholland]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising that point. The all-party save the pub group would be interested to talk to him, because such bowling greens are often part of our heritage, and another community facility that is associated with the pub.

[Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. I give an example of the problem from my constituency. A successful pub was recently threatened with closure because a local housing charity had targeted it specifically for housing. Thankfully, the pub and the community won the day, and the pub was saved. The pub was targeted because the charity saw a loophole in the planning system. It must be closed. I thank my hon. Friend for raising the matter; it is an important point that we must press.

[Greg Mulholland]

I thank my hon. Friend and near constituency neighbour. He is absolutely right. As with all successful pub closure campaigns, I congratulate him and his community on having the courage to fight that campaign. Sadly, given our weak planning laws, such campaigns are often not successful.

The Government have said that they will take action on restrictive covenants, which I warmly welcome. I am sure that the Minister will say a little more about the Government’s proposals, but I understand that a consultation will be held this year. I hope—I have no doubt—that it will lead to the abolition of this extraordinary practice, whereby the owner of a pub, whether it is a brewery or pub company, can slap on a covenant that says that it must never be a pub again, with the community having no say on the matter. It is absurd. It is anti-competitive and anti-community, and it must be outlawed.

I bring to the Minister’s attention one of the other many tricks used. I call it the restrictive covenant by the back door. My hon. Friend the Member for York Outer (Julian Sturdy) was lucky in his campaign, but we often see pub companies or individuals deliberately choosing to sell the pub for non-pub use even though they have received viable market-value offers from those who wish to continue running the pub and serving the community. There is nothing to stop that, but the effect is the same. The community loses its pub even when someone wants to buy it.

We have some wonderful small breweries, and some fabulous small pub companies are popping up, with real entrepreneurs taking on pubs throughout the country in small numbers. It would be a far greater number if the larger companies were not able to ignore offers from the community or other pub companies. That problem must be addressed. In Otley, in my constituency, there was a pub called The Woolpack, which had served the community for many years and had considerable historical merit. It was sold for non-pub use even though there were companies that wanted to buy it and run it as a pub. The decision to end that pub’s service to the community was entirely taken in the boardroom of a company, which must be wrong. Often, such decisions are made even when the company or individual who wants to continue to run the pub puts in a higher bid. That is because an organisation deliberately wants to shut that pub—in the same way as restrictive covenants—so as to lessen the competition for the other pubs that it may have in that area.