06/06/2026
“I get very conflicted about all the ‘save the pub’ campaigns that go on. If things need protecting, they’re not doing themselves any favours. Pubs are not institutions or historical monuments; they’re businesses first and foremost. Beyond that, they’re places that have to work. A pub will be saved by the pub itself, nothing else.
It would be nice to have lower rates and lower duties, but that’s not really the issue. The issue is the quality of pubs themselves.
I’ve said this before: there had to be a bit of a natural cull. As the statistics show, there were once many thousands of pubs. In some parts of Britain there was one — or even two — on every street. But we don’t need as many as we did. They’re no longer a refuge for single working men who can’t feed themselves; that world has largely disappeared.
Today, pubs are more social and dining spaces. Going to the pub is more of an event.
There’s still room for a few old-style boozers — the kind whose passing everyone laments, with sawdust on the floor, one type of beer, and a jar of pickled onions on the bar — but I suspect most people don’t actually want that.
The simple truth is that we no longer need as many pubs as we once had, and in the end, the good ones survive while the bad ones fade away.”
What do you think of what James May is saying?
