Labour MPs heading back to their constituencies this weekend will do so with a sense of relief that another turbulent term in British politics is over. But those hoping to pitch up at their local pub for a restorative pint with colleagues and constituents may find festive cheer is in short supply. In fact, some may not be allowed through the door.
For the past few weeks, pubs across the country have been putting up signs declaring “No Labour MPs” in protest at changes to business rates announced by the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, in her latest budget.
The campaign means, for many Labour MPs, there is one less place to escape the bruising reality of their party’s unpopularity. Backbenchers now say they frequently encounter hostility in public spaces after a difficult first 18 months in which the party’s ratings have plummeted from about 34% to 18%.
“It can be hard being the MP of the area you have always lived in,” said one. “The local pub is where we used to go with the kids and just be a normal family. But the last few times we’ve just ended up being shouted at by other customers. Now I’m not even sure we’ll be able to get in.”
That sense of dismay is palpable in a recent video posted by Tom Hayes, the Labour MP for Bournemouth East, about being banned from one of his local pubs, the Larderhouse.
“It’s the Christmas season, it’s meant to be the joyful season,” he said. “But the Larderhouse and other businesses with a No Labour MPs sticker in the window, they are undermining the inclusive culture that business owners locally have helped to nourish.”
He went on to add: “We have to get politics off the high street full stop, but especially at Christmas.”
As well as denying politicians a port in the political storms that are so commonplace, the row threatens to taint the broadly positive reaction to last month’s budget, at which Reeves won the support of backbenchers and the financial markets by raising taxes and scrapping the two-child benefit cap.
“The pubs row is the one weak spot in the budget,” admitted one minister. “That’s the thing we may need to backtrack on.”
‘Pubs have a special place in the British psyche’
After a difficult few years in which pubs have been hit by high costs, the pandemic and the impact of younger people going out less, publicans were optimistic this budget might bring some relief – specifically with a long-promised revamp of business rates.
But the chancellor poured cold water on those hopes, leaving the system unreformed and choosing instead to reduce headline rates and commit £4.3bn over three years in financial support for the retail and hospitality industries.
It may have seemed a gesture of goodwill, but the value of that support package has been dwarfed by the impact of a three-yearly property revaluation that has caused the taxable value of pubs and restaurants to spike from their Covid-affected lows.
Starting from next April, rates will rise by 115% for the average hotel and 76% for a pub, compared with 4% for large supermarkets and 7% for distribution warehouses. Whitbread, which owns pubs, restaurants and the Premier Inn hotel chain, says it will have to pay between £40m and £50m in tax as a result.
Joe Butler, the landlord at the Tollemache Arms in Northamptonshire, said: “Literally overnight, the click of a finger, the value of our business has doubled. That’s going to be a huge increase for us.”
And pressure on publicans is inevitably reflected in the price of a punter’s pint.
“The price of a pint is now unaffordable. When we first took this pub on 10 years ago, we charged £3.40 a pint. We’re now verging on being £7 a pint,” Butler said.
At the same time, Covid-era tax reliefs are falling away, while hospitality operators are still absorbing the rise in national insurance and the minimum wage from last year’s budget.
“If you wanted to write the worst possible budget for pubs and consumers, you wouldn’t have got far away from what came out,” said Ash Corbett-Collins, the chair of Camra, the campaign for real ale.
Many in the Labour party believe this is one fight they should not have picked, not least because of the role the local pub plays in British culture.
Richard Quigley, the Labour MP for the Isle of Wight West, who also runs a chip shop on the island, said: “We said for two years to pubs and hospitality businesses that we are going to help you out but then they get hit by this revaluation. We can’t have rates going down for large multinational companies but up for small restaurants and pubs.”
Some point out that Keir Starmer himself has long been a regular at his local pub, the Pineapple in north London, and frequently speaks of their importance to local communities. “There’s nothing any of us like better than going to the local for a pint, myself included,” the prime minister said in February.
But pollsters liken picking a fight with pub owners as doing so with NHS workers.
Joe Twyman, co-founder of the public opinion consultancy Deltapoll, said: “From the Queen Vic [in EastEnders] to the Rovers Return [in Coronation Street], pubs have a special place in the British psyche.
“For many people the local pub is perceived to be an important part of the community, even if a good proportion of those same people will rarely actually drink there.
“The political risk with making an enemy of pubs is that your opponents will easily be able to accuse you of attacking at the very heart of this country and its history, particularly in rural areas. And they will be able to produce many emotive examples to prove their point.”
‘Not a personal vendetta’
One of those examples is Andy Lennox, the landlord at the Old Thatch pub in Wimborne, Dorset, and the organiser of the “No Labour MPs” campaign. Lennox says he has handed out stickers to nearly 1,000 establishments and is sending out 100 more every day.
He has received support from the presenter Jeremy Clarkson, who runs a pub called the Farmer’s Dog, and Rick Astley, who part-owns the Mikkeller brewpub in north London – though the pop star has said he will not actually ban Labour MPs.
“We have been asking for relief for a very long time,” said Lennox, who is calling for a temporary VAT reduction. “The government is dressing this up as a relief package but that’s not what people are experiencing, and that is the thing that has aggrieved so many people.”
Some in the industry think a protest targeting individual Labour MPs is likely to backfire. “I’m not sure it’s a good idea to ban the exact people we should be trying to invite in and speak to,” said Corbett-Collins.
When asked this week, the Treasury spoke of the support being offered to hospitality. “We’re protecting pubs, restaurants and cafes with the budget’s £4.3bn support package. This comes on top of our efforts to ease licensing to help more venues offer pavement drinks and put on one-off events, maintaining our cut to alcohol duty on draught pints, and capping corporation tax,” a spokesperson said.
The landlords, however, are in no mood to back down, even if losing MPs means losing one more loyal customer.
Referring to his local MP, Butler said: “We know Rosie Writing well and she is a customer of ours.
“This is not a personal vendetta against anyone personally, this is not aggressively throwing anyone out. We would politely ask her to leave. It’s nothing personal. This is just a stand that we’re taking collectively as an industry.”
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