Slow death of the British pub

Commenting on the impact of the smoking ban on the pub industry, columnist Vicki Woods - the recipient of a Forest Christmas card promoting the Save Our Pubs and Clubs campaign - has this to say in today's Daily Telegraph:

In a year when the postman brought me fewer handwritten, stamped and posted Christmas cards, the corporate ones stood out. I liked a depressed Santa sitting under a pub sign saying NOBODY'S INN. It was a Merry Christmas from Forest (the pro-smoking people), hand-signed in different biros by Nicky, Sue x and Squiggle.

On the back was the business: please Save Our Pubs and Clubs by visiting amendthesmokingban.com. I duly did, and found a campaign pleading for some flexibility over the UK's blanket ban on smoking in public places. I approve of flexibility (and David Hockney, especially when guest-editing on Today) and disapprove of what my late mother called "tin Hitlers", ie people with a statutory authority to boss you about.

Full article HERE. Please comment.

PS. The aforementioned "Squiggle" is, er, me. Note to self: must make signature more legible in future.

Update on Sunday, January 3, 2010 by Simon Clark

Lots of comments in response to Vicki Woods' article in the Telegraph (above). I particularly like this one:

I am joint licensee of an unspoilt country freehouse. There are no machines, pool table or jukebox. Our customers like it that way. They also used to like being able to smoke when enjoying a peaceful pint or two. We had a separeate non smoking dining room for those that wanted to get away from the smoke. Our trade has fallen considerably (50%) since the ban, this coupled with cheap supermarket booze will be the death of us.

Our younger customer tell us that when they are going out for an evening in town they get cheap vodka and beer from the supermarket and drink this at home before they go out, so they can drink less and are probably completely trollied before they get there. Then of course its the pubs that get the blame for binge drinking.

The way forward as I and several other publicans see it is:

1. For the smoking ban to change and let it be the publicans choice. (After all if smoking is that bad why not ban it altogether - but silly me the government would lose all the revenue.)

2. Supermarkets to be forced to sell alcohol at a proper price (lets face it pubs can't buy it for what the supermarkets are selling it for)

3. Sort out the pubcos who are being too greedy.

And for your information neither myself or my partner or any of our bar staff smoke but we would all much rather have a smoking smelly pub full of happy customers rather an an empty one.

Click HERE to read all the comments.

Save Our Pubs & Clubs - the gig

Fantastic evening at the Cross Kings in London on Wednesday night. I must admit that I had reservations that an evening of "grunge-fuelled rock 'n' roll" in support of the Save Our Pubs & Clubs campaign would work, but I couldn't have been more wrong. (Apologies to organiser Dan Donovan, above right and below left, for doubting him!) It was great and I would happily do it again.

Full report and more pictures to follow over the weekend.

Rock 'n' roll animal

Photographer, musician and graphic designer Dan Donovan has worked with us for a number of years. In 2007 he created a personal photographic journal entitled Ninety Smokers. Featuring many friends of Forest, it was published online HERE.

Today Dan is keen to help promote the Save Our Pubs and Clubs campaign. One half of garage rock band King Kool, he writes:

Hi Everyone

You may or may not know but I play in a band called King Kool. We have a launch party coming up in London to promote a single release.

My band will headline the gig and musicians from the 90 Smokers project will be playing with their bands also. Forest are funding the gig and we'll use it to promote the Save Our Pubs and Clubs campaign.

The gig is in the basement bar at The Cross Kings near Kings Cross in London. It's more of a rock 'n' roll dungeon and the event will be loud and raucous.

If this is something you fancy please come along.

King Kool are a grunge sounding outfit, not dissimilar to Iggy Pop and The Stooges.

Also playing are Larp (post punk outfit similar in sound to The Clash or Ramones) and Native Souls (ball crunching funk rock).

Let me know if you're coming so we can get an idea of numbers. The venue is pretty small so we need to know in advance.

Rock 'n' roll dungeon is a pretty good description of the downstairs bar at The Cross Kings. The colourful main bar however has a very different and rather bohemian aura and outside, weather permitting, there is a comfortable smoking area.

If you'd like to join us, email dan@battenburg.biz. You can download the flyer (see previous post) HERE.

Now for something completely different

Save Our Pubs & Clubs - the video

This morning, the second anniversary of the public smoking ban in England, the Save Our Pubs and Clubs campaign has released its first video. Filmed at the launch of the campaign in Westminster last week, it features Antony Worrall Thompson, Greg Knight MP, Mark Littlewood (Progressive Vision), Simon Esnard of the Butchers Arms in Luton, and me.

Over the next few days the video will appear on the following blogs, Iain Dale's Diary, Guido Fawkes, Devil's Kitchen and Dizzy Thinks. We will also be sending a copy of the video, on DVD, to MPs, MEPs and other decision-makers.

To view the video on YouTube, double-click on the image above. If you want to put the video on your own website or blog, the embedded code is available on YouTube.

See also:
Antony Worral Thompson leads campaign to overturn smoking ban (Daily Telegraph)
Forest re-ignites calls for smoking ban reform (The Publican)
Slow death of the great British pub (Daily Express)

Update on Wednesday, July 1, 2009 by Simon Clark

Liberal Vision has a link to the video HERE. The first person who has commented doesn't sound very liberal at all!

Update on Wednesday, July 1, 2009 by Simon Clark

Old Holborn has blogged it HERE. And Dick Puddlecote HERE.

Sunday Express: amend smoking ban

The Sunday Express has an editorial praising Antony Worrall Thompson's support for our new campaign to amend the smoking ban:

It's great news that Antony Worrall Thompson is making a stand for common sense on cigarettes. The Government ban on smoking is forcing the closure of six pubs a day. Clubs and restaurants are also suffering while the number of smokers shows no decline and the health of the nation is unchanged.

Thompson’s campaign has backing from MPs from the three main parties and the group is fighting for reform when the law is reviewed next year. They’re asking for rooms in pubs and clubs to be set aside for smokers. It is a simple, sensible voluntary move that would improve our right to choose without damaging the health of others.

In a separate article, the paper reports:

Mr Worrall Thompson, who smokes 20 cigarettes a day, is one of Britain’s most prominent smoking campaigners. Though he admits that it is not a habit he is proud of, he says the issue is about liberty and free choice.

He claims that the Labour government chose to implement the most draconian smoking ban available, despite warnings about the dire economic and social consequences such a move could have.

“Why is it that on the Continent, governments gave bar owners a choice? In Spain, premises which are smaller than 100m square can choose whether they allow smoking or not but if they are bigger than this, they must provide clearly divided and ventilated smoking sections. That’s the model we want here,” he said.

Full report HERE.

Dizzy supports our new campaign

Highly regarded blogger Dizzy Thinks adds his weight to the Save Our Pubs & Clubs campaign HERE. Not all the comments are so supportive! If you haven't yet done so, you can sign up to support the campaign HERE. Please invite your friends and family to do so too.

No blogging day

No blogging today. I am giving a presentation to the local Pubwatch group in Braintree, Essex.

Save our pubs ... amend the ban

Yesterday afternoon someone sent me a text message. "Where are you?", it said. "At the Queen's Head in Coggleshall, Essex," I replied, truthfully.

It's early days but we are currently working on a new campaign called "Save Our Pubs and Clubs: Amend the Smoking Ban". (I know, it's a bit of a mouthful, but it does what it says on the tin.) Coalition partners include the Adam Smith Institute, the liberal think tank Progressive Vision and, most important, several branches of the Federation of Licensed Victuallers Associations who represent self-employed licensees in the licensed trade.

Yesterday was our first meeting with publicans. Our host was Paul Lofthouse (above) who runs, with his wife Liz, the Queen's Head in Coggleshall. Paul not only initiated the meeting, he also got the local media interested, including (as you can see HERE) the BBC.

As I say, the campaign is currently in development but as soon as there is more to report (including how you can help), I'll let you know. In the meantime we need to find many more publicans like Paul Lofthouse who are willing to stand up and be counted.

Update on Thursday, January 29, 2009 by Simon Clark

See article in local paper HERE. The story was also covered by BBC Radio Essex.