Landlord to quit

HADLEIGH landlord Bruce Dye is preparing to throw in the towel after 15 years of running a pub.Mr Dye, owner of the White Horse, Stone Street, near Hadleigh, is hoping to get planning permission to turn the building into a home.

HADLEIGH landlord Bruce Dye is preparing to throw in the towel after 15 years of running a pub.

Mr Dye, owner of the White Horse, Stone Street, near Hadleigh, is hoping to get planning permission to turn the building into a home.

The pub is in an isolated spot not close to many houses and on the opposite side of the A1072 Hadleigh bypass from the town itself.

Mr Dye said: "I'm working on my own about 70 hours a week and making about £2 an hour.

"If I sell the pub as a pub I won't have enough to buy a house and there's about £100,000 difference between the building's value as a pub and as a house."

Mr Dye said he had had the pub valued by agents, who said it was worth £150,000 as a pub.

He said: "We are not a village pub, there are only about a dozen houses in Stone Street near us. Concern about drinking and driving and lifestyle changes have changed our business in a major way.

"About 12 years ago there were 30 pub pool teams from Hadleigh and the villages around it, now there are five. There just isn't the demand any more."

Many rural pubs were surviving by concentrating on food, he said, but that was not an option for him. Turnover is £600 a week and could not support employing any staff, so he had no chance of taking any time off.

Babergh District Council has a policy of trying to keep rural businesses and employment and would normally ask for a pub to be marketed as a going concern for at least a year before granting planning permission for it to be turned into a house.

But Mr Dye said if he had to wait until that process was complete he would consider closing the pub, staying in the current living accommodation and getting a job.