Our heartfelt thanks to Cliff Parisi, who arranged breakfast interviews this morning with BBC Radio Essex, which you can hear below.
Sonia: We’re talking about community pubs now on BBC Essex because the village community of Littlebury, which is near Saffron Walden, are coming together to take over their local pub. The Queen’s Head has been closed for about four months, but after being inspired by other local success stories in the area, more than 100 supporters have now pledged to invest into buying that building. It’s 400 years old. Chris Shucksmith is the chair of the Littlebury Community Pub campaign. He’s been telling BBC Essex he believes they can make it work.
Chris: There are definitely many people around the village who we haven’t seen as much since the pub closed. It’s much, much harder to meet people around the village without a pub bringing people together. We’ve got 126 potential shareholders from the village and from the wider area who have pledged their financial support. The total pledge so far is £122,000. So we are almost a third of the way there.
We know that many, many pubs are closing their doors, but yet we also think that fundamentally there’s nothing wrong with the economics of this pub. We think professionally run, serving people what they’re looking for, we think it can be successful.
Sonia: Actor Cliff Parisi played Minty on EastEnders, Fred Buckle in Call the Midwife. and Cliff is on board with the project and joins me now on BBC Essex Morning Cliff.
Sonia: Good morning,
Cliff: good morning. How are you? Thank you for doing this. Oh, you’re very welcome.
Sonia: So tell us what the pub means to you and how important it would be to keep this going.
Cliff: Well, it’s not just our village. It actually serves Saffron Warden as well, because we’re just a mile outside and there’s five villages in the parish, and all the pubs in all of those villages are gone. So this is the last one in the area. It’s really important that we keep this open. because of our mental health alone, there’s lots of people that live on their own in the village, a place to go to meet other people, to talk about local issues, to have a few beers, take the family on a Sunday, have a Sunday roast.
And by the way, I will be cooking in the kitchen and I came forth in Masterchef - so my food is fantastic.
Sonia: Wow. So you’re going to put your money where your mouth is. You’re going to be in the kitchen doing a bit of cooking then as well? That’s awesome.
Cliff: Yeah, yeah, I’m going to be cooking up a storm, probably once a month. But I’ve also got other celebrity chefs that want to come down and cook as well. So that would be a surprise. But I’ve got some really great celebrities that want to come down and cook in the kitchen. So we are desperate to save this pub. We’re so close. We just need the final push. There are no grants available or anything like that. So we need people in the area, to pledge a minimum of 50 quid and we can get it across the line and save it.
Sonia: As we mentioned, it’s an old building. Just give us a sense of what it looks like as well. I bet it’s quite stunning, isn’t it?
Cliff: It’s a lovely building. It’s the 14th century. It’s a lovely building with a great garden, car park. We’re going to have, we’re going to have car charges probably in the car park too. So if you come in your electric car while you’re having your dinner, you can, you can charge up your car. Yeah, it’s a beautiful pub and it’s got rooms upstairs. So, you know, for Airbnb and things like that, we’ve got Duxford Airfield up the road and they have air shows. We have lots of laboratories around here that are always looking for rooms. So, you know, it is a viable pub. It just needs the community behind it.
Sonia: Yeah, because of course, Green King, I’ll read a statement from them in a bit and they say obviously, you know, selling a pub, never an easy one. But we no longer believe we’re best placed to operate these pubs going forward. If they can’t make it work, how confident that you guys, how confident are you that you can make it work?
Cliff: Well, I think the thing is that they take too much fat off the top, you know, and if you’ve got, if you’re making profit, which we will, and the pub has, we’ll just reinvest it in the pub, you know, we’ll have a professional manager running the pub. It’s not for profit. All the money is going to be ploughed back into the community and the pub and the surrounding projects. So we’ll make it work. We’ll definitely make it work. We’re not worried about that or concerned about that. That’s why we’re all putting our own money in. So we’re getting no help at all from any government or any grants or any charities. This is all us. Actually, we’re getting some advice from the Plunket Foundation, but that’s just advice. There’s no money there.
Sonia: Yeah, and as you say, we heard from Chris a minute ago, a bit of money already raised you confident that you can get it over the line?
Cliff: Well, we’ve only got six weeks to raise. Well, we’ve got £122,000, we need £350,000. So we’re just over a third of the way there. Yeah, we are confident. I think even if we all double up what we’re offering, we’ll get there. … Maybe we’ll set a toll to come through the village, vehicles at one end, and charge them 50p for driving through. Maybe we’ll do that. That’ll raise some money. Yes.
Sonia: He’s put his plans down now as we speak, aren’t you? There was a story in the news the other day, just a couple of days ago, talking about the number of pub closures, 50 pubs a month shutting in the first half of the year in England and Wales. It is a grave situation. You pointed out the benefits that pubs can have on people in terms of social and mental health. But that is a worry, isn’t it, that the hospitality industry is really struggling right now? It’s desperate.
Cliff: It’s really desperate at the moment. You know, pubs are worth more as houses. That’s the problem. You know, so they shut these pubs, they turn them into properties, but where does everybody go? Where’s the help of the community? The next time you see everybody is when someone’s died in the village and you all will end up at the church at a funeral. So it’s really important. We’re serving five villages, plus Saffron Walden itself, because we’re only a mile outside. So all of those villages and Saffron Walden itself, we’re really begging on any… put some money in, let’s save this pub, let’s keep this fabulous asset for the community going. And also there’s a 50% pay-back from the government, tax relief on any pledge that you put in. So. Yeah, and we’re quite close to all the end where they have lots of concerts as well. So we’re right next door to that. So it’s an asset for them to people can sleep, stay over. And, you know, it’s just it’s nice to have a pub, isn’t it? You just go, I want to go for a walk, take the dog out, go for a walk, have a beer, sit by the fire and have a chat to some locals and see how they’re getting on. Just check in with people because you don’t like knocking on people’s doors, do you? and an email is cold and the text is cold. Nice to see people face to face and I think it’s good for your mental health.
Sonia: Yeah, what do you think the impact would be if it didn’t reopen?
Cliff: Well, I just think that there’s a lot of people in the village that won’t see anybody, that won’t get out. The post office has gone, the shops gone, the surrounding five villages don’t have any pubs. We’re the only one left. And at the moment we don’t have a pub, it’s closed. So it’s so important to get it back open again. I think it will… We have games, you know, we have village. We’ve got a great community here. We’re always getting together to do stuff. But the village… The pub is the hub. You don’t have to organise to open it up. You know, it’s there. It’s open all the time. The doors are open. If you need to go in there and have a chat with someone, you can go in there and have a chat, you know, play games, darts. You know, we have live music. We’re planning on doing some comedy, storytelling, all kinds of activities we’ve got planned. So it’s vital. It’s really vital for the life of this village.
Sonia: Well, fingers crossed I can come and have a Prosecco with you in a few weeks time then, perhaps or months time, Cliff?
Cliff: You will get a free drink and if I’m behind the bar, you’ll get a free dinner as well because you’ve been brilliant this morning. Thank you for supporting us.
Sonia: Oh, you’re very welcome. Will you keep us posted? Will you keep us posted on how it all goes?
Cliff: Can I just give you the pledge site? It’s littleburypub.co.uk-forward-slash-pledge. Please put some money in, even if it’s just 50 quid, let’s save another great pub, a very, very old pub for the community.
Sonia: Thank you so much for coming on, telling us about it and keep us up to date, won’t you? And I’ll see you there soon. Yeah, okay. We’ll see you there. All right. Thank you, really appreciate your time.
Sonia: Oh, thank you, bless you, Cliff. Thanks for coming on. Thank you. That’s Cliff Parisi, the actor from EastEnders, called The Midwife, and now very much involved in a campaign to get that pub reopened. This is the Queen’s Head in Littlebury near Saffron Walden. Green King says, “making the decision to sell a pub never an easy one and after exploring all options, we no longer believe we’re best placed to operate these pubs going forward. We’ve therefore made the difficult decision to sell the Queen’s Head. for existing use as a pub and are also progressing an offer from a community group for the Ickleton Lion, which is subject to contract and relevance approvals. They say they remain committed to operating great pubs at the heart of their communities in Essex and are proud custodians of more than 100 across the county and have significantly invested in many of these over the last three years.”
Cliff there, talking about the efforts in the community to get that pub back open.
Sonia: How important is it for you to have a local pub to go to in your community? Maybe you’ve suffered by the loss of one. So read those national stats that came out just a few days ago about the continuing decline of the pubs in terms of numbers in England and Wales and the rate of them closing down as well.
