24 Hours to prove I’m not a troll!

24 Hours to prove I’m not a troll!

Nothing surprises me anymore when it comes to UK brewers and pubcos - I’ve been around too long to let their nonsense slip by unnoticed. Sadly, some still fall for their crap and Propel journo Martyn Cornell seems to be one of them.

Last Friday Martyn and I got into an argument on twitter after I called his pro pubco article on the recent London Economics report on pubs inaccurate and delusional. He didn’t like it of course and  gave me 24 to prove the report wrong or else become a zythopilliac troll.

Here is the tweet exchange and my email to Martyn below,

Steve Corbett ‏@SteveC271220 Dec

More inaccurate, delusional gumph from @zythophiliac who feels important as he continues to scrape of few crumbs of the pubco table.

                                                               

Martyn Cornell‏@zythophiliac

@SteveC2712 "inaccurate, delusional gumph" isn't feedback, without evidence to back that claim it's just you indulging in knee-jerk trolling

Steve Corbett ‏@SteveC271220 Dec

@zythophiliac claims of "Trolling" are usually the first line of defence for those who know their in the wrong.

Martyn Cornell ‏@zythophiliac20 Dec

@SteveC2712 Right, Steve - send me a list of my inaccuracies and delusions. I'll give you 24 hours. Otherwise you're just trolling.

Martin

Only 24 hours to supply you with rebuttal evidence or I become a troll? A little harsh don’t you think Martin? The Fair Pint team are beavering away on the LE rebuttal document as we speak – it’s a tad too long at the moment but it should be good to go shortly. Once complete I’ll send you a copy. BIS officials broke up for the hols a couple of days ago so there’s no point rushing it off.

I note that you’re a beer historian so I expect you have some experience of the sector. I think we can all lay some claim to experience of one sort or another. It’s not the experience of the people in it that enrich a particular sector but more how we choose to apply it and whether, despite the opinions we form as a result of our experience, we can continue to develop and learn from the experiences we continue to have and the new information that comes to hand. Part of that process is understanding and accepting criticism. I’ve always known that unpalatable views, delivered to us by people we might not like, can still be right.

So where are we now? The consultation has turned into a farce if I’m truthful, the BBPA had a game plan as they continue to play games with some inexperienced BIS officials. The LE reports a shocker, full of inaccuracies and guess work, all supplied and rubberstamped by the BBPA. Their plan in 3 parts was:

1                    Manipulate the consultation

2                    Avoid a statutory code

3                    Go skiing.

So how did they get on? Their plan was to get the RICS back on track – which was always going to happen because of the conflicts within the TRVG – squeeze the FLVA to say more fluffy nonsense - get the ALMR on the firm and cherry pick as many tenants and brewers to hand write glowing testimonials.  All of that would give them a chance of scoring some points with the usual damaging tosh about self-regulated codes of practice. Once achieved the game plan was to present the whole sham as a fait accompli and to marginalise other voices pushing for change. It’s embarrassing really.

And then there’s the real world. Pubs still failing at record rates for reasons denied by people causing it and then helped in doing so by people who should know better. The BBPA think it’s all jolly unfair that people with money and dinner parties should be outed as the bullies they really are. Like the idiot who fronts the PMA, I think you’re looking for goodwill where it doesn’t exist. It’s a plausible assumption to expect a high degree of honesty and integrity from those operating public limited companies. That degree of honesty and integrity is lacking in some of the larger pub companies and I would say that there are some in the media, you included, that are naive of these issues. I’ve seen some awful things over the years many include tenants that have been misled. Lies are told about trading histories and tenants are advised that they don’t need legal advice. Punch used to offer to pay for a lawyer to represent the tenant “no changes to the draft lease” were to be made. A great many people have been subjected to this sort of treatment which looks substantially like nothing more than a ‘timeshare’ type scam. Similar methodology seems to have been applied to dealing with investors. As you know, the pubco model was devised largely by people who are no longer connected with the sector and have long since departed with the cash leaving billions that will never be repaid to the bondholders and eye-watering interest bills that suck hundreds of millions out of the sector every year. The model leaves the tenants unable to maintain the building and the pubco cannot afford to either.

As for Fair Pint – we have been rightly critical of so called “leading figures”. In my own view the likes of Ted Tuppen etc are little more than overpaid frontmen for a scam that took place some time ago. The BBPA truly is a risible organisation that has sold its soul to serve the interests of large pubcos and the tie. Its annual rounds of pleading with the treasury, seen once more today, look more and more ludicrous, whilst saving pubs and jobs is given as a reason for the pleading little or nothing will be passed down to publicans. A duty cut and removal of the escalator hasn’t stopped pubs closing so I can’t expect the treasury will fall for that one again.  

All in all it’s a mess Martin. The men that set up the pubcos never had a long term interest in the sector but spotted legal loopholes, the greedy and less intelligent brewers, the naive trade bodies etc. Down at Fair Pint towers we are interested in the root of the industry. The publicans, the customers and the small creative brewers. We want them to succeed. The tie and the anti-competitive, monopolistic mess the pubcos have created make that very uncertain as we all unfortunately know.

Forgive my ramblings. I suspect nothing I say matches the news of Nigella Lawson.

Very best wishes.

S.

Andrew Griffiths MP and the Duty Scam

Andrew Griffiths Calls for an extensions of the beer duty freeze!

You can read his comments here:

http://www.thegrocer.co.uk/fmcg/mp-calls-for-extension-of-beer-duty-freeze/353091.article

My Response:

More delusional ‘gumph’ from Andrew Griffiths as he attempts to mislead hard working publicans and consumers into thinking a cut in duty will be passed down the line to pubs and beer drinkers. It won’t of course and Griffiths, acting in his role as M for Punch and Enterprise, knows this. Duty is paid at source by the producer. The producer decides whether to pass on a tax concession and of course they don’t. If they are forced into concessions by property owning pub companies – of the likes of zombies such as Enterprise Inns and Punch Taverns – then that company retains the benefit and pays it away in debt costs usually overseas to bondholders.  In short, whether it is the treasury or Griffiths’ friends down the BBPA then someone will have their hand in the consumer’s pocket.

Griffiths, MP for Burton,  is far too close to the pubco/brewer mouthpiece; the BBPA, and here once more we see him begging for a tax hand out for his wealthy mates. The BBPA truly is a risible organisation that has sold its soul to serve the interests of large pubcos and defend at all cost the disgraceful beer tie. Griffiths managed to convince the inept George Osborne that a duty cut was good for pubs last time round and not a single penny of it was passed down the line to pubs and consumers. This call for a duty cut extension is round two of the same old scam.

Caught Between A rock And A Hard Place!

Caught Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Is this more evidence that Cable & Co have absolutely no idea what to do with the pubcos and the beer tie?

http://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/General-News/Statutory-code-BISC-chairman-Adrian-Bailey-urges-Government-to-act-now

Consider this:

Whether tenants like it or not it is clear that whatever government decide to do – even if that something is nothing – there will be some form of collateral damage, albeit inadvertently, on parts of the sector. If government legislate and give tenants a MRO or a ‘tied tenant no worse off’ then some pubcos may not survive it. Punch for example are teetering on the brink of extinction and it will only take a small shove to send them over the edge. Whilst I accept most tenants will be safeguarded by their lease agreement, it still leaves an uncertain long term future for pubs as there may not be an automatic right to renew especially if there is a mass pub jumble sale.

And then we have other companies that currently do business with the pubcos - brewers (family and micro) suppliers, maintenance contractors, builders, logistic companies – the list is endless and many companies/people will be affected by changes in legislation.

We would argue that pubs will still need the services of these companies and that is of course correct but we all must agree there will most definitely be fall out if government legislate and much of it will not be pretty.

So back to Government’s dilemma.

I expect they realise the above and find themselves firmly between a rock and hard place: help small businesses and there will be collateral damage, much of it ugly and backed up I expect with legal challenges, or do nothing and continue to see pubs close, tens of thousands of people lose their jobs with ex publicans and their families relying on state handouts. 

My point I suppose is they’v e left it too long to make change.  They had the perfect opportunity in 2004 but failed (just like the beer orders) to make adequate provision for the sector as a whole and whatever they do now, almost ten years later, will undoubtedly have serious consequences for parts of the sector.

Fair Pint were right; the beer tie doesn’t work – I would argue it never has – and Cable & Co, even if we were to imagine there are no dark forces in play, must be struggling with the situation they now find themselves in. It’s simple really, whatever they do they lose either way.

For my part I say burn the bastards. They’ve taken too much already!