28/09/2026
Hi all;
This is a bit of a read, but I’d be very grateful if you could spare a few minutes of your time to go through it. I’ve added links to back up many of the points made if you fancied a proper deep dive.
Some of you may already be familiar with, or have already signed, the petition to lower the VAT paid by the hospitality industry. Today the BII (British Institute of Innkeeping) published the findings of a report that they’d conducted which included some pretty stark stats.
https://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/Article/2026/09/28/bii-urges-pm-to-cut-pub-vat-to-10-as-survey-warns-two-in-five-could-close/?utm_source=newsletter_daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=28-Sep-2026&cid=DM1297330&bid=1087698246
It reports that only 'a quarter of pubs reported making a profit between January and August this year’. One quarter. These aren’t necessarily pubs that are falling apart and empty, they’re businesses that might well be heaving on a Friday night or fully booked on a Sunday lunch.
It also adds that ‘one in five expect to close if the current cumulative tax burden remains’.
In an article published by the British B**r & Pub Association (BBPA) in May of this year they reported that approximately 2 pubs are closing each day and the general fear is that this will continue to happen – or accelerate in numbers – until something is done to alleviate the pressures that hard working hospitality operators face. That’s two more pubs each day, by the way, that are now contributing £0 towards the treasury instead of something, staff that are now no longer contributing towards their own taxes or NI. I remember seeing a report last year by industry body UKHospitality that the sector accounted for almost HALF of all job losses within the UK over the course of the year!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9d355nw7jzo
https://www.ukhospitality.org.uk/hospitality-hit-hardest-by-job-losses/
This isn’t to do with greed as some comments made under posts similar to this might lead you to believe, we’d just like to – like anyone would if they started their own business, especially one that’s requires working very long, unsociable hours – be able to make SOME money! On a £5 pint (and these numbers are approximate but in no way far-fetched) around £2.40 goes towards the treasury, and after other costs are considered such as the cost of the b**r itself, staff, utilities and other pub running expenses, the operator is only realistically expected to make about 12p per pint for themselves.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cpvzypy8ndyo
Why 10%?
The current rate of 20% is amongst the highest in Europe. France, Italy & Spain pay 10%, in Germany its as low as 7%. A reduction would slow (it will unfortunately not stop) the rate at which pubs are closing, make the sector more attractive for investment and increase employment. It would also mean on a personal note, that we might be able to start actually paying ourselves..
Of those pubs surveyed for the BII report, a reduction in VAT would mean that about 75% of businesses would be able to invest back into their pubs and increase staff hours & numbers.
So we need your help. The link at the bottom of this post takes you to a website for a movement called VATstheproblem – a cause pioneered by Tom Kerridge. In the top right in a button that says ‘sign the petition’. It takes next to no time at all and we’d be incredibly grateful if you can sign it. Almost 390,000 people have already done so and the more there is the higher chance there is that something might be done to save our pubs and restaurants.
I’ll leave you with this; and I’m a bit apprehensive to do so but it’s a very good example of how it is affecting us at The Silver Fox. We’re only a little wet-led village pub, and typically take between £7/£8k a week, 90% of that figure is over the bar, the other 10% is food. So we’re busy – happily busy. Last December we had 4 weeks of £10k+ sales with me working four 60+ hour weeks. On the 2nd January I gave our landlords everything in our bank account to pay for drinks purchased and rent, and a day later I had a brown envelope through the post with an £8000 VAT bill in it. So we started the year after a very successful Christmas with -£8000. To counteract the inevitable comment about how 20% of our daily/weekly sales should just be put aside in a separate account as it isn’t ours I will say that it simply isn’t as straightforward as that. I have to prioritise paying my wonderful staff as I can’t do it all myself and they have their own bills to pay, I have to pay my utilities otherwise they’ll be cut off and I can’t open, I have to pay my landlords for the b**r otherwise I’ll have nothing to sell, I have to buy food for our lovely Sunday roasts, any immediate maintenance issues that you don’t see coming that need immediate repair gets bumped to the front of the queue. It goes on.
We’ve made changes to try and swing things back in our favour; 1 bar staff instead of 2 on our busy Sundays, cut opening hours, heavily reduced our food offering because the cost of utilities far outweighed that profit we were making from lunches and didn’t renew our TNT subscription.
I’m not the best business owner, but I’m a good landlord and we’ve made a good pub. We would like to continue to do so.
Link below for the signature. If you’ve made it this far, thank you for reading and also thank you to our wonderful patrons who make our space what it is.
Jason & Nicola
The boss of Britain's biggest pubs group urges the chancellor to extend business rates relief.
