Heritage Public Houses Bill
Debate between Lizzi Collinge and Anna Dixon
Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire (Mike Wood) for raising the important issue of heritage pubs. I grew up in a small village in north Cumbria. We were lucky enough to have two pubs, both of which I worked in as a teenager—most memorably one Christmas day, when I was presented with a Mrs Santa Claus outfit to wear. As a teenager more interested in heavy metal, I was not very pleased. Those pubs were important community hubs. I feel lucky to be representing the constituency of Morecambe and Lunesdale, which has many more excellent pubs than I could possibly mention in one speech.
Before this debate, I went on Facebook to ask my constituents what their favourite heritage pub was. The comments section was absolutely inundated—it was fantastic to see the passion that my constituents have for their locals. Morecambe and Lunesdale has dozens of great public houses, many with beautiful heritage features or important heritage settings. The Old Hall Inn in my town of Heysham is apparently the oldest dwelling in the borough, having been built in 1598.
People can go from the Black Bull in Sedbergh to the Royal in Heysham, perhaps via a cheeky pint of Wainwright in the Albion at Arnside, looking across at the lakeland fells. They could even engage in a “west end wobble” in the heart of Morecambe, usually starting at the Exchange, possibly popping into the Constitutional Club and finding their way to the newly opened Prince Albert on Albert Road, which has a fantastic cellar that no one could guess existed from the outside.
We are spoilt for choice. I invite any hon. Member here to come on a little pub crawl with me. I maintain that I have the most beautiful constituency in the country. Any visitor to our pubs will get to see every corner of it.
Anna Dixon
On her many visits to her fantastic local pubs, has my hon. Friend enjoyed a pint of Yorkshire ale? The excellent Saltaire Blonde, brewed in my constituency and named after the fantastic world heritage site village of Saltaire, is distributed nationwide. Has it found its way into any of her local heritage pubs?
Lizzi Collinge
I have not tried that ale. I wonder whether those of us on the correct side of the Pennines would welcome a Yorkshire pint or not—but I am sure it is delicious. Pubs are vital community assets, whether in Yorkshire, Lancashire or Westmorland. British life often happens over a pint and maybe a bag of Scampi Fries or—even better—a packet of Lancashire crisps. My tenuous claim to fame is that Wainwright Beer is named after my great-great uncle Alfred Wainwright, who was a fell walker and writer. He did enjoy a pint at the end of a walk, although I have to say that his mother, who was a strict teetotaller, would be turning in her grave at the idea of her son having a beer named after him.
I have spoken before in this place about the need to have spaces in our community where people can drop by, see a mate, run into people they know or even make new friends. Much as I love the great coffee shops in my constituency like the Salty Bean, or maybe something a bit more traditional like Lewis’s, which has many heritage features, you cannot beat a swift half at the Dispensary at the end of a long week.
It is about not just community—I will come back to that—but conserving important architectural and cultural buildings. The Tivoli Bar in Morecambe, which was named after the Tivoli gardens in Copenhagen, closed a few years ago, but I remember the inside of it being stunning. The Tivoli and the Queen’s Hotel in Morecambe could be fantastic assets to our town and examples of heritage buildings being preserved and put to good use; instead, they lie neglected. The Tivoli is owned by Samuel Smith’s Brewery, and despite Morecambe BID and I trying to get it and other absent landlords to engage on how we get more buildings open and working again, unfortunately we did not get any engagement from the brewery when we wrote to it back in February.
Lizzi Collinge
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. His case reminds me of my visit to a block of flats in Arnside just a couple of weeks ago. The balconies have been deemed unsafe and the developer and property management company are both trying to charge residents a huge amount of money because they have not created a proper sinking fund. They are also dragging their feet on everyday maintenance and safety issues. There is more we could do, although we are bringing in great reforms to things like leasehold and other matters. The principle is that if someone is responsible for something, they should take responsibility and fix the mess they have made, so I support my hon. Friend’s point.
Communities can also take measures through the assets of community value scheme, which was introduced by the Government in 2011. Local authorities are responsible for ensuring that the scheme is run in accordance with the legislation.
Rather than adding to the planning regime, it is more important to make sure that we support pubs to thrive through everyday policy. Ask any pub owner and they will talk about rising operating costs, particularly for energy, and changing alcohol consumption habits, which make it harder to make a profit. The Government are taking action on that.
I am a member of the Energy Security and Net Zero Committee, which often speaks about business energy costs. I would like to flag the importance of the clean power 2030 mission to the survival of pubs and other businesses. When we go into pubs, we want them to be nice and warm, which means that they have very high energy costs. The Government are doing important work to decouple the price of electricity from the price of gas, which is set internationally and is damaged by international events.
For pubs specifically, the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act 2026 will ban the use of upwards-only rent review clauses in commercial tenancies. Those clauses have meant that rents can only ever stay the same or rise, regardless of market conditions. Pubs that are signed up to the pubs code already receive that protection, but the ban will extend it to heritage pubs, further increasing support for these important institutions.
I was pleased that the Government announced the 20% business rates discount for pubs, clubs and entertainment venues, which has helped to give them some breathing space. I would point out that there are other businesses very similar to pubs, like the Avanti restaurant I visited in Kirkby Lonsdale, whose owner kindly brought together a group of local businesspeople for me to speak with. They would like to see parity on that tax relief. I encourage pubs to check whether they are eligible for the £61 million community right to buy fund rolled out by the Government, which funds people in deprived areas to take over community assets—something my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Anna Dixon) talked about.
Rather than relying on planning protection, which can be slow, those measures give communities agency over a place and the opportunity to operate those assets successfully. There is also the Pub is The Hub programme, which helps pubs in rural areas like mine to diversify and is backed by £3 million of Government funding.
Community ownership and engagement are really important to the Government. They are strengthening them further through the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act, which will introduce a new community right to buy and give communities real power of ownership. Communities will have the first opportunity to purchase and 12 months to raise funding, which is a significant improvement.
Local communities should determine which spaces and places are most important to them. A growing number of local residents across the country are stepping into the gap and saving heritage assets. There are some brilliant groups like that in Morecambe and Lunesdale. I want to give a specific mention to the Save Our Sun campaign in Dent. Dent is a beautiful village nestled in the Yorkshire Dales national park—I have three planning authorities in my constituency, which is always fun. The Save Our Sun campaign has pulled the community together to save the Sun Inn, and I wish to put on record my thanks to the group. They have done a fantastic job, and I was pleased to hear recently that they have progressed a little further.
Anna Dixon
I am pleased that my hon. Friend is backing a campaign to save a pub in beautiful Dent. The Dales way links parts of my constituency with hers, and we sometimes forget that those heritage pubs are not only part of the local community, but also provide a fantastic resting place for visitors to our areas who enjoy walking in our beautiful countryside. One pub with a very long heritage tradition is Dick Hudsons in Bingley, which lies on the edge of a popular walking route. Does my hon. Friend agree that we want to save those pubs not only for local communities but for all those who come and visit our areas to enjoy them?
Lizzi Collinge
I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend, and Dent is a prime example of a place where visitors come. My constituency has so many fantastic places for visitors, whether it is the front at Morecambe, which is getting Eden Project Morecambe, beautiful Arnside, which I mentioned earlier, Milnthorpe, Kirkby Lonsdale, the whole Lune valley, or the Yorkshire Dales national park. The businesses that serve our communities all year round also serve visitors. They are fantastic spokespeople for our area, and they also show the quality of our local produce, which is important.
I want to know that the provisions in the proposed statutory register would create some meaningful protection, and not add another layer of bureaucracy. I want pubs to be live assets—I spoke earlier about the fact that buildings will change over time. Our heritage and communities are not static things, and from an architectural and heritage point of view it is important that their character is not lost. If something is in its original state, but that original state is mouldering, that is not a good thing, and when preserving those features it is important that any upgrade or renovations are done sympathetically and are in keeping. I recently visited the Royal Oak in Burton in my constituency. It has done a fantastic renovation that is very sympathetic to the original building. I want us to keep our pubs open and running, to preserve those historical buildings for future generations, and to leave it possible for them to have new life when the owners so choose.