Hertfordshire brewer and operator McMullen’s has opened its first newbuild pub in 25 years, and has spoken of the long and difficult road to launch thanks to Government red tape.
The Prince George in Milton Keynes opened last week, serving a wide range of world beers, handcrafted McMullen ales, a varied wine list and the company’s “excellent value” Chicken & Grill pub menu.
McMullen’s says the pub has already received “a fanfare of positive comment on various social media sites” and is “on target to exceed expectations”.
However, McMullen’s managing director Peter Furness-Smith has hit out at the Government for its failure to help pub businesses grow, whilst at the same time taking vast amounts of money in tax.
He said the opening of The Prince George was “good news for the Exchequer as they will now earn over £600k per annum from our investment in the form of various taxes, as well as the income tax receipts from the 40 new jobs we have created”.
He added: “If I offered most people the opportunity to earn over £600k a year, without taking any risk, on the back of someone else making an investment, I doubt anyone would turn it down. More importantly I suspect most would go out of their way to help speed up the project.
“Amazingly, it has taken us six years to buy the land from a Government agency, get planning permission and then, at the last minute, experience a further delay of six months while we spent £20k on a survey to find six newts.”
He said that through VAT, beer duty, rates, national insurance, energy levies and corporation tax the Government will receive “at least three times” what the company’s investors hope to earn.
“Despite the welcomed reduction in beer duty in the last budget we remain an industry that is not only over taxed but one that is slowly being strangled by bureaucracy from enthusiastic agents of the state,” said Furness-Smith.
“It is also outrageous that Government supports supermarkets to sell alcohol at pocket money prices, therefore further undermining pubs who also have to carry the cost of supervising the sale of alcohol.
“To add insult to injury the health lobby fun police continue to blame pubs for the effects of excessive drinking by a relatively few irresponsible consumers.”
Furness-Smith said the Government needs to create “a competitive level playing field” with supermarkets by reducing the rate of VAT for pubs to 5%.
He added: “Such a measure is also forecast to be fiscally neutral as well as creating over 600,000 jobs all over the country, mainly benefitting the young unemployed.
“The short term gap in funding could be narrowed by charging supermarkets VAT on ready meals, which are allegedly unhealthy and responsible for so much obesity.”
