Pubs in Basingstoke and Merseyside have been named joint winners of this year’s Community Pub Hero Awards.
Rich Curtis at the Portsmouth Arms, and (inset) the team at the Horse and Jockey
The winning pubs are The Horse and Jockey, in Melling, Merseyside, and The Portsmouth Arms, in Basingstoke. Judges decided to make two top awards this year in recognition of the very different community support offered by the two pubs.
Both pubs received a £500 donation from Matthew Clark to the charity of their choice, as well as a trophy, while winners and finalists received a certificate, to be presented by their MP.
The awards were organised by PubAid and the All-Party Parliamentary Beer Group and sponsored by Matthew Clark.
PubAid co-founder, Des O’Flanagan, said: “Judging this year’s awards has been a real challenge. We struggled to choose our ten finalists from an incredibly strong field, and selecting a winner from that shortlist proved impossible!
“We decided to give the top award to two pubs who took very different approaches to supporting their communities in lockdown. The Portsmouth Arms started a record-beating pub quiz that has raised more than £66,000 for charities, while The Horse and Jockey cooked and delivered 15,000 free hot meals and sent out 1,000 care packages. Faced with ‘comparing apples with pears’, we voted to reward both!”
Supporting communities during lockdown
The awards attracted 115 entries, including 60 from MPs who nominated pubs in their constituencies. This is the third year of the competition, which was reshaped and renamed to focus on pubs’ support for their communities during lockdown, rather than traditional fundraising.
Richard Hayhoe, marketing director at Matthew Clark, said: “This year’s awards have shone a light on the great support lent by so many pubs to their communities, despite frequently facing uncertain futures themselves.
“Like everyone else in the hospitality industry, we’re delighted that pubs have started to re-open. And it’s been great to see that people have turned out in numbers to support the pubs that supported their communities during lockdown. Let’s hope that one upside of the pandemic is that people now understand just how important the pub is to its community.”
Mike Wood, MP for Dudley South and Chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Beer Group, said: “These awards have been a great opportunity for MPs to celebrate how landladies and landlords in their constituencies have stepped up to the mark to support their community during the pandemic. Yet again we have seen that pubs are the antidote to isolation.”
