SOME Labour MPs are facing being barred from their local pubs this festive season over the impact of the Chancellor’s Budget.
In some venues across the country, signs declaring “No Labour MPs” have been put up in protest to changes to business rates announced by Rachel Reeves last month.
Even Reeves herself has been barred from her local pub in her Leeds constituency, according to the Daily Mail.
The campaign was launched earlier in December, with more than 250 venues signing up to make their displeasure with the Labour Government known.
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Martin Knowles, landlord of the Marsh Inn, who previously posed with Reeves in the pub following the General Election, has joined the campaign after he said he was hit with a £2500 hike in business rates.
“I thought I'd ban them all, including the local MP, as they are not doing our industry any favours at all. Our clientele seem quite happy with the ban,” he told the Daily Mail.
He said that if the Chancellor wanted to regain entry she would have to lower VAT, PAYE, stop increasing the minimum wage and curb business rates to stop them “going through the roof”.
Former Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson’s Cotswold pub The Farmers Dog also displays the sign.
The sense of dismay among Labour MPs over the issue spilled onto social media.
Tom Hayes, the MP for Bournemouth East, posted a video about being barred 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 added: “We have to get politics off the high street full stop, but especially at Christmas.”
At the last Budget, Reeves poured cold water on a long-promised revamp of business rates, leaving the system as it is. Instead she reduced headline rates and committed £4.3 billion over three years in support for the hospitality and retail industries.
The impact of a three-yearly property revaluation is also having an impact, causing the taxable value of restaurants and pubs to spike after a low during the Covid pandemic.
Starting from next April, rates will rise by 115% for the average hotel, and 76% for a pub. In comparison, large supermarkets will see a 4% rise, and distribution warehouses 7%.
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Pub and restaurant-owning firm Whitbread, and also the Premier Inn hotel chain, said it will pay between £40m and £50m in tax as a result.
Joe Butler, landlord at the Tollemache Arms in Northamptonshire, told the Guardian: “Literally overnight, the click of a finger, the value of our business has doubled.
“That’s going to be a huge increase for us.”
He added that the price of a pint is “now unaffordable”.
Butler added: “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.”
Andy Lennox, landlord at the Old Thatch pub in Wimborne, Dorset, organised the campaign. He says he handed out stickers to nearly 1000 venues, and is sending out 100 more each day.
Lennox, who is calling for a temporary VAT reduction, said: “We have been asking for relief for a very long time.
“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.”
The Treasury insisted support was being offered to the hospitality industry.
“We’re protecting pubs, restaurants and cafes with the budget’s £4.3bn support package,” a spokesperson said.
“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.”
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