HERE’S A HEALTH UNTO HIS MAJESTY
It has been announced that, to celebrate the coronation of King Charles III, licensing hours for pubs, clubs and bars will be extended by two hours, from 11pm to 1am, on Friday 5, Saturday 6 and Sunday 7 May. This followed a month long consultation in which 77% of the public were in favour.
Meanwhile, there appears to be a dearth of Coronation ales. Windsor & Eton Brewery have announced that they will be brewing a beer called Return of the King. This 4.2% ABV bitter is W&EB’s first fully organic beer and is brewed with barley from the local Royal Farm and English hops. As well as in cask, it will be available in 500 ml bottles and 440 ml cans. It is understood that Shepherd Neame are producing one as well, as their Cask Club beer for May, but details are not yet known. These are the only ones that I have heard about.
SPRING BUDGET
The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt, presented his spring budget to the House of Commons on 15 March, a brave thing to do on the Ides of March. In advance of the event, as well as making a formal policy submission to the Treasury, CAMRA had asked its members to lobby their MPs to ask the Chancellor to include the following:
• setting the draught duty rate at 20 per cent lower than the general level;
• restoring energy bill support to pubs, clubs and brewers;
• action to address the unfair burden of business rates, such as introducing a lower multiplier for pubs, social clubs and their supply chain based on the social and community value that they provide for communities;
• changing the definition of cider for tax purposes to increase the required minimum juice content.
So, how did we do? Ignoring the Chancellor’s silly comment about warm beer, there was good news as regards the duty rate discount on draught beer and cider. This was increased to 11p (9.2%) and will come into effect with the other scheduled changes to duty in August. However, also from the August changes, the freeze on all alcohol duty will end and duty will increase in line with inflation, as measured by the RPI. The increased discount will help pubs compete with supermarkets but higher prices on other drinks that they sell will not help.
No additional measures were announced as regards help to either pubs or brewers with energy costs nor was anything said about any reform of business rates. There is a possibility that something may happen in the autumn.
CAMRA’s national chairman, Nik Antona, commented, “The Chancellor has made a welcome move to increase the draught duty rate discount to 11p, which will help pubs compete with the likes of supermarket alcohol. However, the lower tax rate is not coming until August, and we must hope that as many pubs as possible will be able to keep their doors open until then. With many parts of the licensed trade struggling to make ends meet, and consumers tightening their belts, hikes in general duty rates are the last thing breweries need, so it’s right that general duty rates have been frozen until the new system is introduced. With support for energy bills being extended for households, licensees will be devastated to hear that help for them will end on 1 April. This was a make-or-break budget for pubs and social clubs, and the future of many businesses is now at risk, with an imminent cliff edge in support and rocketing energy costs on top of the other pressures facing the licensed trade. Communities will lose their local pubs because energy support is ending. It is also bitterly disappointing not to see the extension of help for pubs and breweries with the burden of business rates. With current support schemes due to end in 2024, these rates bills can be the difference between continuing to trade or having to close for good. The Government urgently needs to reform the whole business rates system to fix the issues with this unfair system and help to protect our pubs.”
If anything significant is found in the small print, we will report it in the next edition.
THE STATE OF THE TRADE
The first reported instance of pubs cutting their hours came at the end of January when Revolution Bars announced that, to save on energy costs, their outlets would not open on Mondays and Tuesdays. This was however to be reviewed in February. Pubs and bars doing this also, of course, save on staff hours. One observation on the current pattern of trade came in an article on the MyLondon website. The manager of a pub in SE1 observed that, although his regulars had not cut back, he had seen a serious fall off in corporate entertaining and the company card being used to pay for staff drinks. Other pubs are closing their kitchens because of the combined effect of energy costs, staff recruitment problems and rising food costs. A report on the BBC website business pages said that wet-led pubs had seen higher increases in sales than food-led pubs in every month in 2022. This was based on data compiled by analysts CGA from pub company managed houses.