THE £7 PINT

Beer prices spark fears for boozers

EXCLUSIVE

IT’S time to drown your sorrows – if you can afford it – as the £7 pint could be heading to a pub near you.

Beer drinkers are already bitter about the price of a pint, which has rocketed by up to 50p in the past month alone.

The largest rise in five years is being blamed on inflation, soaring energy and transport costs and higher wages – but there may be worse to come.

Yesterday, Heathrow’s Big Smoke Taphouse and Kitchen was selling Medicine Man IPA for the equivalent of £8.30 a pint and Amstel lager at Manchester airport was £7.

In South London, a pint of Neck Oil IPA at Borough Market’s Bunch of Grapes cost £6.65, while the Dion Bar, near St Paul’s Cathedral, charged £6.50 for a pint of Gamma Ray.

Experts fear the rising prices will be another nail in the coffin for Britain’s pubs, which were already aleing long before the lockdowns.

Greg Mulholland, from the Campaign for Pubs pressure group, told how the “extraordinary” prices would put beer lovers off going out and stop publicans making any money.

He said: “The energy bills for pubs – for which there is no support and no restriction – are terrifying. Large pub companies have put their own prices up for tenants. I have seen cases of 30p, 40p or 50p more for a pint.”

On average, a pint in the UK costs £4.07 and £4.84 in London. But Time Out magazine warned the “sevenpounder is starting to pop up”.

The Campaign for Real Ale fears the national average will soon be £5.

Drink bosses also warn that returning VAT to the pre-pandemic level of 20% could be fatal for many businesses.

Emma McClarkin, of the British Beer and Pub Association, said: “Pubs are having to find ways to ensure their viability and keep their doors open. The cost of doing business in 2022 is fundamentally different to 2019.”