Fair Pint founder loses High Court arbitration case

Licensee Mike Bell, one of the founder's of the Fair Pint campaign, has lost his chance to appeal against a decision made in arbitration over a rent review at his pub.

Bell, licensee of the Enterprise Inns-owned Portobello Gold, in West London, was seeking the right to appeal against an arbitration award made in 2008.

But judge Simon Brown QC, sitting at the High Court in Birmingham last week, ruled that he would not be given a chance to challenge the decision further.

The arbitrator had set the new rent at £76,500, an increase of 27.5 per cent on the previous rent, and representing 51.25 per cent of the divisible balance.

But Bell said the rent should be cut from £60,000 to £31,600.

However the judge agreed with the arbitrator's valuation method and said the award should stand.

The case featured a claim by Bell that Enterprise was seeking to increase the rent to take account of extra trade created by a hotel above the pub.

Bell said: "It is clear the valuation is inaccurate because it significantly underestimates the actual costs of our investment into the hotel and way overestimates the profits gained from the pub."

He added: "Enterprise has argued that the pub is in a prime location, but their valuation does not take into account the fact that despite having a well regarded restaurant, the Gold is not food, but wet-led.

"It is in a landlocked location with no outside space, and the combination of the smoking ban and the recession has hit trade hard with the beer sales falling by 70 per cent since the late 1980s."

However he appears to want to carry on the fight, pointing out that the rent review date is two years old and "the recession has hit".

Simon Townsend, Enterprise Inns' chief operating officer, said: "This is an example of a rent review which should never have gone to arbitration, or subsequent appeal, and only did so as a consequence of the unrealistic proposals put forward by Mike Bell and his advisor David Morgan.

"A great deal of time, effort and money has been unnecessarily wasted."

He added: "This is a great pub, in a prime location, and we certainly have no criticism of the way it is run by Mike Bell. We do not regard this as a victory, merely the confirmation of the correct rent for the pub."

Earlier this month a licensee couple - Charles and Leslie Brooker - were successful in appealing a rent review decision, meaning they will have to pay £12,800 less rent than asked for by Enterprise. However the company argued the decision does not set a precedent.