Adam Withrington: Isn't this a Fair Point?

We are our own worst enemy in this industry - we really are.

When all and sundry are calling for industry unity on the issue of alcohol duty, it finally looked like we might be making some headway. All trade associations lobbied the Treasury with one voice (a rarity) and we had the support of over 200 MPs on the issue of axing the beer duty escalator.

But then anti-beer tie pressure group Fair Pint came charging in suggesting that beer duty had nothing to do with the issue of 39 pubs closing a week and that it was all about the tie.

And did the government go for their arguments? Of course they did.

I have it on very good authority that Treasury minister Angela Eagle asked British Beer & Pub Association chairman Michael Turner many questions on the subject of the tie when he visited Downing Street to make the official case on tax to the government.

But don't be fooled that Ms Eagle is on the side of Fair Pint. She no more knows her way round the intricacies of the tie than I do around a hedge fund.

What the government wanted on the issue of beer duty was an "out" - a get out of jail free card - and the Fair Pint group, with their very well paid lobbying team from Connect Public Affairs gave it to them. On a silver platter. With a bow wrapped around it.

And in doing so they have sold the whole pub industry short. Fair Pint's strong belief is that a freeze or reduction in beer duty would have made no difference to the price of a pint over the bar in a pub.

I quote Steve Corbett's reaction to the Budget on the Fair Pint website:

"Beer duty is paid by producers not by retailers, without guarantees that any reduction in duty would be passed on to publicans and their consumers reductions in duty would make no difference to the cost of beer in pubs or help struggling publicans in keeping their businesses going."​

This statement is quite frankly absurd. The suggestion from Fair Pint is that beer duty has no impact - has no impact for struggling licensees. The fundamental point here is that there are a whole host of reasons behind the current struggles of many hard-working licensees around the country. The poor working of the tie system may be one of them. High beer duty is undoubtedly one of them. There is no one single cause. So we have to play this game more cleverly than we currently are.

But what gives Fair Pint the right to make the decisions on what is important and what isn't in the industry? They say that beer duty has no impact on ordinary licensees.

Who exactly do they speak for? Do they speak for every single one of the

55,000 pubs in this country? For the free traders and managed houses as well as tied pubs. For all the angry licensees who have castigated the government for this decision on our website this week?

This has shown Fair Pint up for exactly what it is: a pressure group, with little care for anyone who does not support its cause with the same level of commitment.

There is a word for that kind of behaviour: fanaticism.