Pub sale a bitter blow for locals who hoped to run it
RESIDENTS CLAIM THEY WERE ‘DUPED’ BUT BREWERY BOSSES SAY THAT’S ‘SCURRILOUS AND UNTRUE’
A COMMUNITY who fought to save their local boozer claim they were ‘duped’ out of the chance to buy it – now plans have been submitted to bulldoze it for housing.
The Penny Farthing in Denton was closed by Thwaites Brewery in February and put on the market the following month.
Those living on the St Anne’s estate begged brewery bosses to reopen it, describing it as an ‘important part of their social community.’ But their pleas fell on deaf ears and Thwaites continued its search for a buyer.
In April, locals took matters into their own hands, forming a committee before putting forward an application to Tameside council to transfer The Penny over to the community.
They were given six months to find the cash – £295,000 as listed on Fleurets website – and set to work to raise it.
A few weeks later, a developer contacted the group and offered to help save the pub. He said he would buy the site and lease the pub to them for £400 a month on a 10-year ‘no-break’ lease, then build on the car park. But in an email to the woman due to take over as landlady, he said the group would need to withdraw their community bid for the sale to go ahead, so they did.
In July, the buyer pulled out. The Penny Farthing went back on the market and the committee were not offered the chance to resubmit their bid.
The pub was then sold to Manchester Developments North
West Limited who, in a planning application dated in September, put forward proposals to demolish the boozer and build five pairs of semidetached houses on the site.
This application was submitted to Tameside council in October, which residents say they will be objecting to.
John Leech, chair of the residents’ committee, said: “Collectively as a group we all still feel duped.
“It was highly disappointing that we withdrew our bid on the grounds of the potential buyer seeing through his purchase and we did as advised and withdrew our offer on the bid.
“Why weren’t we given the option to carry on with the bid?
“For a brewery that prides itself on being family-run, they didn’t appear to care for the families that used one of their establishments, some families since the day it was built.” Denton MP Andrew Gwynne also lives on the estate and was fully behind the community’s bid to take over the pub. He too felt they had been ‘duped’ into withdrawing their bid.
Mr Gwynne added: “It’s bitterly disappointing that residents were advised to withdraw their community asset bid for The Penny Farthing on the basis that another interested party wanted to run a pub from the site.
“This turned out not to be correct and now we are set to lose The Penny Farthing for good. I share the feelings of many local residents that they were duped into withdrawing the bid, only for the owners to always pursue a residential end use.”
A spokesman for Thwaites described the claims as ‘scurrilous and untrue.’
They said: “We are caught up in this completely innocently – Thwaites had nothing to do with the community deciding to withdraw its interest in registering the pub as an Asset of Community Value.
“We entered the contract with the original purchaser in good faith and when it fell through we had no option but to find another buyer. The office of the local MP was kept updated throughout. Any suggestion that there was some kind of set-up or that people were duped by us is scurrilous and untrue.”