Smoking dispute hits new heights

A licensee who was sacked for smoking now has to climb scaffolding to get into the flat above the pub.

Paul Brown, 47, was left fuming after being given the boot for smoking at the Samuel Smith's pub the Brown Cow in York.

And now he and his wife have to scale 12ft of scaffolding to enter the flat because the brewery changed the locks to stop them entering via the pub.

He told The Publican: "​It is not very easy climbing through a window to get to your accommodation especially when your wife is afraid of heights," he said

He added he was amazed the brewery took such a tough stance on the smoking.

I shut the door of the pub because there were hardly any customers. The pub was closed so I lit up a cigarette at the end of a long day," he said. "In my mind I was not doing anything wrong."

But two police officers, a licensing officer and a council official were carrying a routine check on the pub and fined Paul for smoking on the premises.

"Everything was fine with the pub itself. No licensing law had been broken. They fined me £60 and I thought that was the end of it," he said.

But Paul was later fired for gross misconduct and given 15 minutes to vacate the premises.

The brewery changed the locks but erected the scaffolding as a temporary staircase for the couple to use to enter the flat.

He added the brewery had never run through the regulations surrounding smoking on the premises after closing time.

"It came as a very big shock. I expected a warning. I didn't know what the legislation was and I thought that when the door was shut this was my home again. But I discovered to my cost that it isn't."

Paul is now planning to take legal action against the brewery for unfair dismissal.

Samuel Smith's declined to comment.