The Campaign to save the Coachmakers’ Arms goes on despite the decision of the Council’s Planning Development Committee on 11th January.
At that meeting I submitted a formal objection and Jason Barlow made a superb speech explaining why the Coachmakers' Arms should be saved.
The case put by Council officers was that it was impossible to save the Coachmakers’ Arms and have the East / West development and a new police station. That is not the case. Indeed one of the Council’s earlier plans was to keep the Arms.
This is a wonderful and very popular old pub, voted one of CAMRA’s finest heritage pubs. It’s a totally false choice between it and the new development. Hamley needs both. We need a new central bus station (the present one is a disgrace and has been giving out city a bad image for 30 years) but we also need to keep the best of our heritage.
I have asked the Secretary of State to call in the Council’s decision. The fight goes on.
UPDATE
Jason Barlow and Sue Brocott brought their superb campaign down to the Commons and made a presentation to the Parliamentary Save The Pub All-Party Group.
Speaking to a crowded meeting attended by a dozen MPs (including Charlotte Atkins, MP for the Staffordshire Moorlands) and CAMRA (the Campaign for Real Ale), Jason thanked the Group for choosing the Coachmakers' Arms as the first pub that the Group had officially adopted and backed.
He told the meeting that the Coachmakers' Arms was a vital part of Stoke's heritage and history: the only thing that had changed in its 160 year life was the paint.
Nationally pubs are closing at a rate of more than 2000 a year under pressure from developers, from increases in tax on alcohol and intense competition from supermarkets selling cheap alcohol for drinking at home.
But pubs like the Coachmakers' Arms in Hanley (and new pubs like the White Star in Stoke) show that pubs with strong roots in their communities with energetic and enthusiatic publicans can make local pubs popular and successful.