Pubs could be vanishing without trace

IT’S great that pubs are open again. The chink of glasses and the buzz of cheery chatter in the sunshine is a defining image of the idyllic British summer.

All the more so after months of coronavirus lockdown, personal tragedies and with only economic gloom ahead.

Unfortunately too many pubs appear to have gone straight from closedown to the lastchance saloon.

As our investigation shows today, the rules on social distancing and testing customers have gone out the window on a worrying scale.

Customers are behaving as though it’s all over, that there is no longer anything to fear from the Covid pandemic. So wrong.

Local lockdowns, caused partly by failure to follow the rules in pubs, are testimony alone that the virus is still with us. We remain dangerously close to the edge of the point where it could spread rapidly again nationally.

Landlords and pub managements have a critical responsibility to enforce rules to keep not just their customers but the country safe.

If they don’t, they risk last orders again in a new national lockdown.

Landlords are under pressure from bosses faced with months of empty till receipts. Also from customers who just want a good time. We understand that.

But the industry needs to pull together to impose a unified approach and discipline that every pub must follow.

Bluntly, lives are more important than profits.

There will be no profits if the pubs don’t survive.

It’s time to act to stop time being called, for the last time.