Pub Bitch: Celebrity special - Bear Grylls and Prince Harry do their bit for booze PR
Champagne survivalism
Champagne types go to all sorts of lengths to prove how wonderful their products are — as if we needed telling. In the latest outing for Mumm 'ambassador' Bear Grylls, the professional derring-doer was photographed opening a bottle of the stuff with a sabre, just like wot they used to do in the old days. If you don't already know him, Grylls is an all-round action type of bloke, helicoptering into some of the most inhospitable places on the planet armed with only a plastic spoon and a bucket full of guts — last year he broke the altitude record for a man flying a motorised parachute… thing. So lopping off the top of a champagne bottle with a dirty great sword before setting off on a rigid inflatable boat up the North West Passage (ooh-er) was clearly going to be child's play. And so it proved…
Of pubs and politicians
John Healey, Labour MP and minister for pubs in the last government, popped up on The Politics Show recently in a piece that centred on two disgruntled Enterprise Inns licensees. Healey agreed the recession had hurt the trade as a whole, but said pubcos hadn't complained when duty was frozen on his watch as a Treasury Minister, nor would they "answer questions about the way they treat their tenants". Sitting alongside Healey was Greg Mulholland, Lib Dem MP, new father and all-round bête noire of the pubcos. "The best thing they can do is appoint Greg to the post of pubs minister," Healey oozed, without a hint of irony. "Half the Liberal Democrats have got ministerial jobs; he should have one as well." Heaven only knows what Enterprise boss Ted Tuppen would make of that…
Proud of what, sorry?
Still on the subject of the former Pubs Minister, my colleagues on The Publican's news desk were somewhat surprised when Healey, the MP for Wentworth, rang up to ask if they could select a pub in his constituency for him to visit as part of our wonderful Proud of Pubs Week, celebrating all that is wonderful about pubs (pause for breath, etc). I mean, I appreciate the man had his hands fairly full up until May 6 this year, what with being housing minister for a while and then spending what seemed like about 20 minutes with his hands gripped firmly around the nations handpumps, so to speak. But how hard could it have been for a former pubs minister to find a pub in his own neck of the woods. Like, what's that all about, eh?
An industry mourns
It seems as if we humble types in the pub sector have seen the last of Tobias Ellwood, the Conservative MP for Bournemouth East, who at one stage was thought to be a shoo-in for a minister's post overseeing the pub industry, among others. Sadly it was not to be, for our Tobes, a former officer in the Royal Green Jackets, has been appointed private parliamentary secretary to defence minister Dr Liam Fox. So there'll no more waxing lyrical about dodgy Scousers coming to his constituency in order to set up pub shop, which was one of a number of bizarre 'highlights' from his appearance at last year's Association of Licensed Multiple Retailers get-together in Birmingham. Our loss is the defence sector's gain. No, it is. Seriously…
Caption competition
Finally, another in our occasional 'write us a caption' competitions… Prince Harry recently chuckkered off - or whatever is it one does at a celebrity polo match - along with the likes of Kenny Jones, ex-drummer in The Who and Katie Price, aka Jordan. The Prince (see pic right) looks like he's looking forward to tucking into the bottle of Mahiki rum he's about to be presented with, but we want you to tell us what's being said.
Send your caption suggestions and pictures and stories about people in pubs to pubbitch@thepublican.com…
The winning caption gets a bottle of Mahiki. You can't say fairer than that!
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