No Rhyming With Orange

Cancelled!

I'm sorry to report that the gig by local band, Rhyming With Orange, which was to take place at The George in Duke Street, Southport, this Friday 4 December has been cancelled. This is because the pub has closed down again and is all locked up and in darkness. It is sad news for the pub that it seems to be on the brink of permanent closure yet again, but pubs in suburban areas do seem to be at particular risk, a subject I wrote a post about last month.

A certain support act, Nev Grundy, is reported to be devastated. Perhaps there'll be another time.

The Farmers Arms, Burscough

The Farmers Arms

The Farmers Arms is a canal-side pub on New Lane in Burscough, Lancashire. It was taken over fairly recently and the new owners are keen to improve what's on offer at the pub. It is an attractive brick building with moorings on the canal, a patio area for outside drinking, weather permitting, and some fine views. The pub is a popular stopping point for both walkers and cyclists with cycle racks and track pump available. The pub even played a part in the local defence of the area during the Second World War. The two storey tower next to the car park entrance was actually built as a gun tower and was manned to defend against invasion via air or the canal system.

Like many country pubs, food is important here as well as beer. It is served every day at lunchtime and in the evening during the week and all day on Saturday and Sunday; last food orders are at 8.30 pm. Children eat free with a paying adult. On Sunday they offer a roast dinner, Monday is burger night and Thursday is steak night. They can cater for functions such as weddings and funerals, and they are also accepting bookings for Christmas parties. 

Serving our beer 

The real ales that were on when we visited were Moorhouses Black Cat, Wells Bombardier, Tetley Bitter, Moorhouses Pride of Pendle, Sharps Doom Bar, and they usually offer a changing guest beer. Everyone in our party was happy with the quality of the beers they were drinking. There is a happy hour Monday to Thursday 4.00 pm till 6.00 pm, and 4.00 pm till 8.00 pm on Fridays, and the pub is open until midnight every day. They may decide to hold a beer festival in future. There is a quiz night on Thursdays and an open mic night on Saturdays. The pub is family friendly and dogs are permitted in the bar. Car park available. 

Contacts: phone 01704 896021; pub website.

This is part of a series of articles that I am writing for the CAMRA column in our local paper, the Southport Visiter. Previous reviews are here.

Mixing your drinks

Black and tan

A casual comment about snakebite last night got me thinking about how people used to mix two different beers, or beer with cider, a lot more than they do now. Having decided to write something about it, I noticed that Boak and Bailey had recently written about mixing beers in the present day, but I had in mind the old mixes that used to be quite popular.

The most common one was probably bitter with brown ale. We called this 'brown and bitter' when I was student in Warrington, but later when I worked in Liverpool a colleague firmly told me that it was called 'brown bitter'. When I asked why he chose it, he pointed out that you got well over a half of bitter along with your brown ale: this is the same mentality as people who get pint glasses in beer festivals but order halves, thus getting overgenerous measures from lazy bar volunteers.

Another mixture I came across was light and bitter - a bottle of light or pale ale with the bitter. This was sometimes misheard by bar staff in noisy pubs as mild and bitter. I have wondered whether these mixtures arose as an attempt to disguise poorly kept draught beer in the 50s and 60s by diluting it with bottled beer, which would at least have the virtue of consistency. Other combinations I came across included (using the Liverpool terms) 'mixed' (bitter and mild) and 'brown mix' (brown and mild).

'Black and tan' was bitter and Guinness, although I've seen suggestions it should be a pale or light ale rather than bitter. This was often poured to create two layers, as in the picture. I've heard the term used to describe dark mild and Guinness, although using the word 'tan' as part of the description of a mixture of two dark drinks seems odd to me. Light mild would make sense, but that wasn't readily available where I used to drink. The term 'black and tan' was never used in Ireland for obvious reasons; they prefer to call it 'half and half'.

'Snakebite' was bitter and cider in the 70s, but more recently I've heard the term applied to lager and cider. This was quite a lethal mixture, or at least it seemed so at the time. Guinness and cider was called 'poor man's black velevet', the original of course being Guinness and champagne. Once for my birthday party I made a black velvet punch which was very popular, although I replaced the champagne with Pomagne. If I were to try it again today, I'd probably use cava.

There were other mixtures, such as lager and lime, lager and blackcurrant, Guinness and blackcurrant and cider and blackcurrant, but these were just ways of sweetening beer for people who basically didn't really like the taste of it. Also, obviously, they are not mixtures of two alcoholic drinks.

Nowadays I very rarely hear people ordering such mixtures. Perhaps draught beers are more consistent and interesting nowadays. Price too may be a factor, bottled beers being significantly dearer than draught. Or it could just be that the times they are a-changing.

7 out of 10 pubs serve real ale

Great news: research* has shown that 70% of pubs now serve real ale'. However, I note that CAMRA says that "micropubs [are] leading the way". I tend to find hyperbole irritating, and this statement is a good example. There are in the UK:

• 53,444 pubs.
• 37,356 pubs serving real ale.
• 150 micropubs.

This means that micropubs represent 0.4% of real ale pubs. The oldest, the Butcher's Arms in Herne, Kent, is now 10 years old, and yet the turnaround in real ale's fortunes goes back a lot longer than that, as we all know. While I fully agree micropubs are a very welcome addition to the real ale scene, I am struggling to see precisely how they are leading the way. As this hype was contained in a CAMRA press release about the next Good Beer Guide, perhaps I shouldn't be surprised: commerce often supplants reality when you've a product to sell.

Still, the good news is that nowadays we generally don't have to hunt very hard to find a reasonable pint as we had to in the past. I say 'generally' because there are certain types of areas in the UK that remain real ale deserts, such as some economically depressed areas, many council estates and anywhere else devoid of a middle class voices and, more importantly, comfortable disposable incomes. The attitude is clearly any old smooth rubbish for the masses. 

* Research conducted using CAMRA's WhatPub database and CGA-CAMRA Pub Tracker.

Whatever happened to 24 hour opening?

I found this interesting article by Camila Ruz on the BBC news magazine website about the impact of 24 hour opening hours. It was published on 24 November, 10 years to the day since the Licensing Act came fully into force. As the article states:

It was reported that the act would lead to round-the-clock drinking and there were warnings that extended hours would cause chaos. The Royal College of Physicians said it would increase alcohol consumption. Police chiefs complained that their forces would be stretched. One judge said that easy access to alcohol was breeding "urban savages".

The article goes on to show how the anticipated chaos never materialised. As most of us know, alcohol consumption is in decline, as is violent crime, including that attributed to drinking. Teetotalism is on the increase, including among young people.

So how did so many authoritative people get it so badly wrong? Because those people were not speaking objectively, but were applying their own preconceptions, prejudices, preferences and motives. Or, more concisely, they had their own agendas. The consequence of getting things so badly wrong is that future predictions of doom are more likely to face a sceptical eye, which is what happens when you keep on crying 'wolf'.

This scepticism already greets the official guidelines of 14 or 21 units per week. Among my friends and acquaintances, there are people who drink regularly, and others who don't drink much at all, but I don't recall anyone ever suggesting to me that they take the guidelines seriously. If they are mentioned at all, they are usually treated as a joke. Now we find that the prophets of doom have been decisively proved wrong about 24 hour opening which means, as pundits, they are less likely to be taken seriously in future. The irritating thing is that I doubt they realise this.

I don't know anywhere that opens for 24 hours. There was one bar that did so in Southport, but it doesn't any more.

Lancashire Day 2015

This Friday 27 November sees the annual celebration of Lancashire Day, and many pubs in our local area will be taking part. Lancashire Day commemorates the day in 1295 when the county sent its first representatives to attend what later became known as the Model Parliament during the reign of Edward I.

In Southport the following pubs will be involved as far as I know (there may be others):

• The Tap & Bottles, in Cambridge Walks, from 1.00pm will be providing traditional Lancashire beers and entertainment.
• The Inn Beer Shop, in Lord Street have announced that Pete & Pam Bardsley invite you to join them to celebrate Lancashire Day, with Proclamation at 6.00pm, traditional Lancashire beers, music, hot pot, cheese board, cheese & onion pie, Chorley & Eccles cakes, prize for the best dressed Lancastrian. Tel: 01704 533054.

And in West Lancashire similar events as below:

• The Cricketers, at 24,Chapel St, Ormskirk, traditional Lancashire beers, hot pot and tapas. Tel: 01695 571123.
• The Ship Inn, Wheat Lane, Lathom, traditional Lancashire beers and menu. Tel: 01704 893117.
• Ring O' Bells Lane, Lathom, Near Burscough L40 5TE, Join the Lancashire Society at the Ring 0' Bells for a "Lancashire Night" with entertainment by "Tackers Tales" (Sid Calderbank & Mark Dowding) as well as clog dancers, musicians, Lancashire dialect, poems and traditional Lancashire beers, All welcome free entry 7.30pm till 11.pm. Tel: 01704 893157.
• The Farmers Club will be providing free Lancashire hotpot from about 4.00 pm until stocks run out.
• The Hop Vine, Liverpool Road North, Burscough, Lancashire Day beer offer, Burscough Brewery, Duke of Lancaster at £1.50 per pint! Tel: 01704 893799.
• Infusions Bistro, 2-4, Orrell Lane, Burscough, Seven Course Lancashire Feast, Lancashire bottled beers. Tel: 01704 893356.

Info from Jeff Carter, via Mike Perkins, with additional info from Brian Brighouse. Thanks to all.

Other Lancashire Day events, not necessarily involving pubs, can be found here on the tourist board website.

ACV - safeguard or fig leaf?

Sorry for the lapse in postings; I don't like to leave things so long but, as I said on 31 October, I've had recurring minor ailments that have made me feel generally under the weather since September. On the mend now, though.

I've just noticed an item in the Morning Advertiser that may well be a significant setback to CAMRA's strategy of campaigning for pubs to be granted Asset of Community Value (ACV) status. Woking Council has revoked the ACV status of the Star Inn in Wych Hill, Surrey, and has granted permission for it to be turned into a Co-op supermarket. They said that a local community group had failed to show that it had community value as a pub, citing an e-mail from one councillor that stated that the pub had deteriorated with licensees who "tended to cater to younger, rowdy, non-residents of the local area."

The residents said that they'd like the Star to become a gastropub as it was the only place that could provide food, drink and accommodation in the area, which - they added - was already well served by supermarkets. The council replied that another supermarket could also become a valued local asset.

So there you have it. While I know that no one has claimed that obtaining ACV status conclusively and permanently saves a pub, I do feel it may have been relied upon rather more than it merited; it is merely a tool in the process of saving a pub, not the final result. As with so many campaigning issues, it is a mistake to assume a success is permanently in the bag: you often have to fight for things over and over again.

The only other thought that occurs to me is that if the good people of Wych Hill had made greater use of the pub before it became at risk, perhaps it would not have come to this. Use them or lose them.

A dissatisfied customer

I expect CAMRA Southport and West Lancs Branch is rather upset by the letter in our local paper, The Southport Visiter, stating that, far from being the success that a branch spokesperson had asserted, the Southport Beer Festival was in fact a disappointment: there weren't enough tables, the beer choice didn't impress him, and people had to dodge discarded food and plates. He said he spoke to 20 or 30 people who felt as he did. The gentleman concerned is entitled to his opinion, of course, but in my view, he has been rather harsh. I attended the festival twice: I was a floor walker for the Friday evening session, and was a punter on Saturday afternoon.

• Not enough tables. The hall is small and space is limited; when the festival is busy, there simply isn't the space to provide as much seating as they'd ideally like to. There isn't another venue in or near the town centre that is suitable, available and affordable.
• The beer choice didn't impress him. The festival had beers from many local microbreweries that you may not readily come across in Southport pubs, such as: 3 Potts (Southport); Big Clock (Accrington); Burscough (Burscough); Connoiseur (St Helens); Problem Child (Parbold); Red Star (Formby); Parker (Banks); Third Eye (Eccleston); Melwood (Knowsley); Rock The Boat (Crosby).There were also beers from more established small breweries, such as Bank Top, Southport, Prospect, Liverpool Organic and Liverpool Craft. The original point of beer festivals was to introduce people to beers they don't usually come across, and in this respect I regard the festival as a success. I also approve of supporting local microbreweries. But, whatever beers you put on, you won't please everyone.
• Loads of dissatisfied customers. Did he really spend all the time it would have taken to conduct market research on 30 people at the beer festival? Or has he exaggerated ever so slightly? As a floor walker on the Friday evening, I spoke to a lot of people, rather more - I suspect - than the letter writer. I didn't hear a bad word about the festival; nor did I on the Saturday as a customer. 
• On neither day did I see discarded food lying around in any great quantities.

To be fair to the writer, he did give his name and address. I am unimpressed when people write scathing letters to the papers (or, for that matter, put highly critical comments on blogs) and then hide behind anonymity. I am not, however, convinced that his views are as representative as he would like to claim.

In general, I appreciate the efforts of the volunteers on the festival committee who put in a lot of work in their own time for no reward to provide a significant local event which this year supported our local breweries, quite a few of which are very new. That work deserves a better acknowledgement than the letter in the Visiter would suggest.

No robo-licensees

I've just read in What's Brewing that pub licensees are highly unlikely to be replaced by robots in the foreseeable future. Researchers at Oxford University found that there was a 0.4% chance of automated licensees, largely because of the social interaction and cultural knowledge required.

I also expect the robots were unable to inject sufficient sarcasm into phrases such as:

• No one else has complained.
• Haven't you got homes to go to?
• It's meant to be like that.
• This is a pub, not a nightclub.
• No, we don't have WiFi - we talk to each other.
• We opened by that clock and we're closing by it.

Courage Directors

The Guest House in Southport quite often has Courage Directors on, and in recent years I've tended to ignore it as a debased relic of a beer I used to seek out. In the past, it wasn't a common sight in Merseyside, or Warrington where I was a student, but we knew the story of how it was brewed for the directors of the Courage company, and was put on general sale owing to public demand. If we came across it on trips down south, we'd leap upon it with enthusiasm.

The beer is now brewed by Charles Wells of Bedford, brewers of Bombardier and all the Youngs beers. In the last month or so, I've been giving it a try and I have to say that, far from being a brewing relic like, say, Tetleys or Boddingtons, it remains a perfectly acceptable pint in its own right, that stands up well among the newer beers that often surround it on the Guest House bar.

As usual, I looked at the brewer's own tasting notes: "Full bodied with a clean, bitter taste, balanced with a sweet burnt, malty and fruity notes with a distinctive dry-hop aroma and flavour." Actually, that's not too far from the mark at all. It's difficult to remember tastes accurately over a long period of time, and I cannot be certain how the original Directors used to taste, but from what I do recall, it is still recognisably the same beer. I'm wondering whether the Wells version has improved, as I remember not being so impressed in their early days of brewing it.

I'd now describe it as a good example of a classic British beer style; it's not innovative (how long can any beer remain innovative?) and probably not to the taste of those who dismiss 'brown beers' out of hand, but I find it an enjoyable pint nonetheless.

A matter of taste

I've been a bit under the weather over the last 7 or 8 weeks: it's nothing serious, only my recurring sinus trouble accompanied on this occasion by a particularly nasty dose of conjunctivitis that has taken three courses to clear up (at least, I'm hoping it's cleared up). I don't have a very strong sense of smell at the best of times, but I have noticed on occasion recently that when I can't breathe through my nose at all, beer is either almost tasteless or actually unpleasant. I hadn't realised precisely how important even my limited sense of smell was to the flavour of beer.

I've sometimes taken the mickey out of some tasting notes (and doubtless will again) when they are excessively florid in their descriptions of the smell and taste of beer, but I have to accept that some drinkers will inevitably sense more from their pint than I can. This is not news, of course, as we all sense things differently from each other - obviously - because otherwise we'd all tend to have very similar preferences, and clearly we do not. To give a personal example relating to food, I loathe fish and seafood - in fact, the sight of the latter makes me feel queasy - to the extent that I cannot understand how people can put something that tastes so vile in their mouths. But as they do, they must taste fish and seafood very differently from me. Logically, the same applies to beer.

I draw a few conclusions from all of this:

• Tasting notes only have value if you sense beers in a similar way to the person who wrote them.
• The view of certain diehard CAMRA dinosaurs that, if you can only get people to try real ale, they'll be converted and never touch keg or smooth again, is misconceived.
• Beer competitions that are based on panels of experts are of little real value.

Overall, though, vive la différence: the beer world would be much more limited and boring if we all had similar tastes.

Scottish pubs hit by change in the law

The reduced drink-drive limit in Scotland has hit pubs hard, according to the Scottish Licensed Trade Association. They report that more than half of pubs reported a drop in trade over the summer months; the worst affected were rural pubs with more than a third stating that their sales had fallen by more than 10%. In England and Wales, the alcohol limit for drivers is 80 mg of alcohol per 100 ml of blood, but in Scotland the limit was reduced from 80mg to 50 last year. The effect on pubs was entirely predictable, and indeed it was predicted by wise sages such as Curmudgeon and me.

Quick easy fixes that show you've "done something" are popular with many politicians, and the nanny state meddlers of the SNP are no exception. The real problem with drink-driving is that some drinkers will drink whatever they want and then climb into their car and drive, without ever giving a second thought to the limit. The driver who carefully drinks within the limit is not the problem, but he or she will be hit by a reduced limit, not the lunatics who are the real danger on our roads.

At the time the Scots adopted the lower limit, the UK government said it had no plans to reduce the drink-driving limit in England and Wales as it said this would have no impact on "high risk offenders". Despite that sensible approach, I can't help wondering whether, with the ongoing cuts in police numbers, it may at some point become tempting to cut the limit in the rest of the UK. Okay, the result is that you spoil the pleasure of careful drivers, and you close some pubs in the process - but you can claim you're "doing something" and being tough on the causes of crime. And not only that, it's a nice, cheap option - much cheaper than tackling the hardened offenders.

Roscoe Head campaign

There has so far been no progress in the campaign to ensure the future of the Roscoe Head in Roscoe Street, Liverpool 1. The assurances provided by New River, the property developers who have bought this pub, one of only five in every Good Beer Guide, are wholly inadequate. As I previously wrote:

The only assurance New River have given is that there are no plans to redevelop the Roscoe Head ... into convenience stores "at this stage". There is no guarantee about conversion into something other than a convenience store, or how long "this stage" will last.

The campaign is being stepped up. There will be another rally at the pub at 12.30 pm on Saturday 7 November, which will attended by CAMRA's National Chair, Colin Valentine, which is a measure how seriously CAMRA is taking this issue. There may be some music, but at any event Liverpool Branch are hoping for a good, vociferous turnout. I'll be there certainly.

Click here for my other posts on the campaign.

An American's view of British drinkers

I was irritated by the BBC's coverage of certain aspects of the visit to the UK of President Xi Jinping of China. While I have serious reservations about the deal concerning the new nuclear power station, it's not that particularly piqued me. It was the stage managed visit to the pub, especially when the BBC newsreader referred to the President being given a pint of warm beer, thus reinforcing the stereotype promulgated by John Major 22 years ago: "Britain will still be the country of long shadows on cricket grounds, warm beer ..."

Another foreigner, Scott Waters from the USA, has visited us recently for a long holiday. He has written about his impressions of life in Britain, and these have been circulating on the Internet. His observations are quite witty, many pertinent, and I'd say quite affectionate, although it's clear that some of our ways are slightly mystifying. It's always interesting to see an outsider's view of ourselves. I have extracted from his list those comments that refer to drink:

I was in England again a few weeks ago, mostly in small towns, but here's some of what I noticed: 

• The pubs close too early. 
• Pubs are not bars, they are community living rooms. 
• If someone buys you a drink you must do the same. 
• Avoid British wine and French beer. 
• Beer comes in large, completely filled, actual pint glasses and the closer the brewery the better the beer. 
• The beer isn't warm, each style is served at the proper temperature. 
• Cider (alcoholic) is quite good. 
• Excess cider consumption can be very painful. 
• Drinks don't come with ice. 
• Every pub seems to have a pet drunk. 
• Their coffee is mediocre but the tea is wonderful.
• The universal greeting is "Cheers" (pronounced "cheeahz" unless you are from Cornwall, in which case it's "chairz")

Cheers

It's interesting that an American tourist understood beer temperature better than a British newsreader or a former British PM. To anyone who's not convinced: if you think our beer's warm, try having a bath in it. You won't linger.

Have a look at the full list - it's here.

We British prefer 'weaker' beers

According to recent research, we British prefer beer that is nearly half as strong as those on the Continent. The average strength of our favourite beers is apparently 4.4%, as opposed to the 7.9% European drinkers prefer. I'm not very surprised: most of us know that the British brewing tradition is radically different from most of those that can be found in Europe. This is not just a matter of brewing techniques.

The First World War brought serious restrictions on pubs and brewing; at one point it was illegal to buy a round. I've read an account of how a man wanted to buy drinks for himself and his wife and was refused because that constituted a round; his wife had to go to the bar to buy her own. Under the Defence of the Realm Act, licensing hours were introduced, beer was watered down and an extra penny tax put on a pint. The Temperance movement was quite a force in the UK and the brewing industry was not immune to what was, at that time, its increasing impact; these laws gave them a significant boost, although a Temperance appeal to the monarch to declare that a toast to the king could be made just as loyally with a non-alcoholic drink was given short shrift by the Palace. The Temperance movement eventually lost most of its influence when Prohibition was ended in the USA, but the effects of First World War legislation on beer, including upon its strength, continued long after the war ended. In particular, the precedent of gradually but continually cutting beer strengths continued until the 1970s when CAMRA published the strength of all beers: brewers who didn't voluntarily reveal the strength, or weakness, of their products were angry and dismayed when the Campaign had their products analysed and published the sometimes embarrassing results.

Beer drinking was was strongly identified with industrial labour. Workers wanted to slake their thirst after a day's work, especially those in heavy industry: cool pints that didn't have you sliding under the table after just a few were preferred, hence the former popularity of mild in the old industrial heartlands. The decline in mild drinking must be partly due to the ending of much of our industrial base. (There's also another possible factor that I wrote about in May.)

Traditionally, we Britons used to spend long evenings in the pub, often meeting early in the evening and staying until closing time: such long evenings demand a beer that can be drunk in fairly large quantities. Additionally, formerly popular pub games such as darts, dominoes and bar billiards required the players not to be legless.

Our beer strengths have recovered to some extent since CAMRA's exposure of the scandal of weak beer sold at premium prices. It used to be said that one national brand could have been sold legally during the American Prohibition, and there were frequent rumours that some brewers put chemicals in beer to give you a slight headache so that the next day you thought you had a hangover. I've no idea how true these stories were, but the fact that they circulated shows how some drinkers viewed the beers they were sold with a certain amount of distrust.

All these factors are specific to the UK, and have shaped our preference for beers that are less strong than those on the Continent. Personally, I'd prefer to have more pints in the 4.0% to 5.0% range than fewer at 7.9%, but that's what I've grown up with and what I've become used to. I don't think I'm untypical in this respect.

The research was by academics at Anglia Ruskin University based on 65,000 reviews on the app Pint Please.

Has CAMRA had its day?

We found little to smile about in
Greenall Whitley pubs in the 70s.

Does CAMRA have a purpose any more? It seems that I've been reading articles and blog posts on this theme almost since I first joined CAMRA in 1985. At their least contentious, they say that there are now loads of different real ales from a record number of breweries, so it's job done. Others, often written with a 'more in sorrow than in anger' tone, prefer to twist the knife. They went to a CAMRA meeting once, and found a load of bearded weirdos who were loud about their likes and dislikes, while ignoring outsiders, which is usually interpreted as a deliberate snub. Everyone else in the pub was apparently annoyed by the CAMRA types, and the writer concludes by shaking the dust from their feet and swearing never to attend a meeting again. This attitude has recently been astutely parodied in the Seeing The Lizards blog. Another group of detractors are a vocal minority from the 'craft' beer tendency who don't like the Campaign because it won't endorse a beer type that doesn't fit CAMRA's definition of real ale. This is a bit like ranting against the Cat's Protection League because it won't take in dogs.

Beer font? Or the headstone
over many lost breweries?

I am not an undiscerning member of CAMRA, and I have criticised the organisation quite a few times here. I do, however, take issue with suggestions that the Campaign is now redundant, or even that it's insular and exclusive. CAMRA members are not all of a type, no more than the members of any other voluntary mass membership organisation, although there are always those who do fit the stereotype. To present an analogy: Lefties often stereotype Tories, but in my years of local political activity on the Left, I have come across local Conservatives who are likeable people who, in their own way, want to do the best for the local community. From my perspective they're misguided, of course, but the point remains. Reality is always much more multi-layered and complicated than simplistic generalisations suggest - it's also much more interesting. CAMRA is no exception to this. Most CAMRA members don't go round boorishly taking over pubs, insulting lager drinkers and demanding privileges from licensees. Even more shockingly, most male CAMRA members I know don't even have beards. But recycling these myths provides sufficient excuse for some of these writers to feel justified in not playing a more active role in the Campaign. If you don't want to be involved, fine, but don't justify that by peddling hackneyed misconceptions.

The mainstay of
1970's parties

Is the Campaign's work done? We have a record number of breweries and most pubs not only sell real ale, but many have a good selection on offer. We've become so accustomed to this that people sometimes turn their noses up at selections of 'the usual suspects', forgetting that in the 70s and 80s we would have been delighted with such offerings. The snobby attitude to Wetherspoons is a good example of this: when I was a student in 1970s Warrington, we would have thought we'd gone to heaven if we'd come across a pub like Wetherspoons. I recall in the 1980s finding myself in a pub in Hampshire which had six real ales on handpump, mostly from the Gales range. I thought it was wonderful, but today there are some who would turn up their noses because of the lack of variety. 

This is all good, isn't it? Yes, of course, but in the long term there can be little room for complacency. The number of brewers is constantly increasing, but the market is shrinking: pubs continue to close, and beer consumption overall is going down. At some point, these two contradictory pressures must collide, resulting in many small brewers closing, though a few may be taken over by bigger concerns. In ten or twenty years' time, we may look back on the present situation as a golden age. Campaigning to save pubs is a logical response to this problem, because fewer pubs will mean less cask beer, the growth of micro-pubs notwithstanding. Those who short-sightedly argue that CAMRA has no business campaigning for pubs should bear that in mind.

In general, no advances can ever be taken for granted: what was hard fought for can be lost again. The current attacks on workers' rights, the trade union movement, the NHS and the benefit system bear testament to that. Whether or not you agree with such measures is irrelevant: the point is that nothing can be seen as safely in the bag. Progress is not inevitable. In the case of real ale, there are many threats that I've covered many times before, so here is a brief reminder of some of them in no particular order:

• Attacks by the anti-alcohol brigade, aka the health lobby.
• Predatory property companies buying up pubs for redevelopment.
• Debt-ridden pub companies overcharging tenants and redeveloping sites to offset debts.
• Punitive tax levels.

The Plough, Southport, in the
process of being demolished.

There is also the fact that multinational beer corporations want to move in on the market that is currently dominated by micro and regional breweries. I can see nothing that would prevent a repeat of the infamous Whitbread Tour of Destruction which swallowed up so many local brews, replacing them with Whitbread 'Big Head' Trophy Bitter, the deluded pint that thought it was a quart. Sharps and Meantime have already been hoovered up, and I have no doubt that other breweries are currently being eyed up for takeover. A proliferation of new small breweries suggests our beer scene is healthy but it can do little to combat such threats, whereas a campaign of 174,690 members has more of a chance.

The Sir Henry Segrave (JDW), Southport.
If only we'd had pubs like this in the 70s.

CAMRA is often dismissed as just a drinking club. This may be true for some members, and the Wetherspoons vouchers are often cited as proof of this, but most members that I know did not join for the vouchers. Another shocking fact: quite a lot of members don't use their tokens. In addition, I've known even 'drinking club' members become activated when faced with a threat to something dear to them, such as a local brewery or much-loved pub. If there's nothing local to campaign on, they are keeping a network of local branches going so that if a campaign is needed at any time, the structures are already in place. Okay, it might take a bomb to get some people moving, but it's massively better than trying to build a campaign from scratch in the future, should one be needed.

CAMRA's list of some of its successes can be found here - link provided to save me just repeating what they say - and some of these are recent, which refutes the suggestion that the Campaign no longer has a purpose. Many attempts to rubbish CAMRA are motivated by people who are hostile, often with agenda of their own, such as talking up 'craft' beer, and decrying real ale as old hat. CAMRA is not perfect, but then neither is any other mass membership organisation. I should know: I've belonged to quite a few over the years. Despite the fact that I sometimes get impatient or annoyed with certain things in the Campaign, I'll stick with it. People who sit around waiting for the perfect organisation that suits them in absolutely every respect will end up belonging to nothing. For me, this one is still worth belonging to.

References to craft beer advocates in this article refer to a partisan vocal minority. Most drinkers, whether of real ale, craft beers or both, are tolerant and don't mind what others choose to drink.

Askew Sisters gig

The guests at the Bothy Folk Club thus Sunday 18 October are the highly talented Askew Sisters, Hazel and Emily. "[They] are fast becoming one of the most popular and respected duos on the English folk scene. From dark ballads to uplifting dance tunes, they play with driving energy and the unity of two people who have played together all their lives. The sisters use fiddle, melodeon and concertina to breathtaking effect, creating cinematic arrangements that get to the very heart of each song. These create a perfect setting for Hazel’s striking voice, which won her Best Female Singer at the Spiral Earth Awards 2011."

"A definitive album of the current English Folk scene." - Spiral Earth

"Inspired arrangements of traditional music, striking versions of tricky ballads – this is traditional folk in a fine, fresh form." - The Telegraph

"An album of singular and iconic beauty." - FolkWords

" Vocals shimmering above fiddles, viola, melodeons and concertina, [this album] casts its spell." - The Sunday Times

"The edgy alchemy of melodeon and fiddle makes for a vivid and revitalising sound throughout… one of the most atmospheric and erudite albums you’ll hear this year and a model of consummate taste." - EDS

The Bothy meets at the Park Golf Club, Park Road West, Southport, PR9 0JS. Tickets on-line, or on the door. This will probably be a popular night, so best not arrive too late. The venue sells real ale from Southport Brewery.

16th Sandgrounder Beer Festival

This year's CAMRA Southport & West Lancs Beer Festival opens at 6.00 pm tomorrow Thursday 15 October. It is open from midday to 11.00 pm Friday and Saturday. Only £3 to get in (free for card-carrying CAMRA members). Food available at all sessions. Click here for more details.