Please buy our pub!

Regulars from a West Yorkshire pub are desperately pleading with the trade to buy their much loved local and save it from developers.

Save Our Summer Cross (SOS) campaigners are actively seeking potential buyers for the pub in Otley, near Leeds, even though it hasn't officially been put up for sale.

They fear the present owners Phase 7 Properties plan to let the 200-year-old pub fall into disrepair so developers will be able to get planning permission to build flats or houses in its place.

The previous leaseholders were forced to leave after the owners refused to extend the lease (The Publican, October 29). The Summer Cross is expected to be boarded up imminently, which campaigners say has been confirmed by a firm of builders.

Campaigner Shirley Lewis said she and others were sending out letters to pub companies and breweries and "anyone" who might be interested in buying it.

They have also just launched a website to keep the campaign's momentum going.

She said: "We know it's a viable option - it was a thriving pub before it was closed down.

"We expect the owners to let it get dilapidated because the more work that will need doing on it the least likely anyone will take in on."

Campaigners, including local Liberal Democrat MP Greg Mulholland and councilors, have written to the North-London based owner asking what plans it has for the pub but no response has been given.

Mulholland said: "If the company thinks it can do what it wants with the site, they are mistaken. The community will fight any redevelopment of this lovely part of Otley and we will keep campaigning until the Summer Cross is open again as a pub and serving the community".

To find out more visit www.sosotley.org.uk