Some interesting figures have been released by the Greater London Authority (GLA) regarding the number of pubs in London. They show that, having reduced by some 25% since 2001, Greater London had a total of 3,540 pubs in March 2018, an increase of ten over 2017. There were increases in eleven boroughs, no change in nine and net losses in thirteen. The boroughs showing an increase were Brent, Bromley, Croydon, Hackney, Harrow, Islington, Lambeth, Lewisham, Tower Hamlets, Wandsworth and Westminster. Happily, the number of live music venues, which have proved very vulnerable, has risen while the number of LGBTQ+ venues remained stable for a second year running.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
CAMRA\u2019s Greater London Region keeps its own figures which are based on slightly different criteria. Consequently our numbers differ but not significantly. The GLA\u2019s figures are, of course, net. This means that they hide the point that we are still losing around 100 traditional pubs a year and they are being replaced by brewery taps, micropubs and new developments. We are certainly not getting \u2018like for like\u2019. As regional pub data co-ordinator Roy Tunstall told the Evening Standard, \u2018while we welcome new bars, we deplore the loss of the traditional pub!\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Another small scale but interesting development are pubs that were converted to restaurants but in the current economic climate are reverting to being pubs. Two examples of this are the Watermans Arms in Barnes and the Steam Packet in Kew, a former Caf\u00e9 Rouge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The GLA also conducted a survey which found that 74% of Londoners think pubs are important for the capital\u2019s cultural heritage while 45% visited a pub at least once a month. Pubs remain a major attraction for tourists with 54% visiting one during their stay, 68% to socialise and 27% to eat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mayor Sadiq Khan said he was doing everything in his power to support the pub trade and London\u2019s cultural venues and certainly CAMRA\u2019s Greater London region appreciates being able to contribute significantly to the draft London Plan, which now protects beer gardens and includes the \u2018agent of change\u2019 principle for soundproofing new developments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Evening Standard covered the GLA report on 29 August. It was good to see them do so but their comment about the turnaround being down to a \u2018surge in microbreweries\u2019 was somewhat over the top. They did however quote some significant statistics from the report. London\u2019s pubs are split almost equally between large pubs (employing more than ten people) (52%) and small pubs (48%). Pubs in London employ around 46,000 people but only 29% of these are paid the London Living Wage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
CAMRA\u2019s Chief Executive, Tom Stainer, commented, \u201cWe applaud the work that the Mayor\u2019s Office has done to highlight the vital role pubs have to play in London, and to call for more to be done at other levels of Government to work to prevent closures. We know that pubs across the UK, and especially in London, have been struggling with unfairly high increases in business rates bills, while a lot of pub tenants are also squeezed due to having to buy beer through their pub companies at high prices. This means that pubs have to raise their prices, which means that pub going becomes increasingly unaffordable for the average person. Stability is absolutely what beer and pubs in London need right now, which is exactly what we will be telling the Chancellor when we next have a Budget. We look forward to working more with the Mayor\u2019s Office in future to highlight the amazing economic and social value of the capital\u2019s pubs<\/em>.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n