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Hampstead pub can now stay open longer
• In your May 4 issue you carried a letter from myself on the subject of later hours for public houses.
The piece ended: “Is it therefore beyond the realms of possibility that commonsense could prevail here and all three live side by side (Residents, publicans and the local authority) in complete harmony?”
Somewhere, in deepest Hampstead, this has just started to manifest itself! I was delighted to learn that Ye Olde White Bear has been successful on its appeal for longer hours and has now been granted an additional 30 minutes’ trading from Thursday to Sunday.
Not much to write home about you may say but, as mine host Chris Ely told me, this is fine, we can live with this.
Mr Ely, together with several other Hampstead publicans, had no intention of trading into the early hours in any event; he just wanted a small addition to his pub’s trading hours to facilitate those customers who prefer to come out later in the evening and now he can provide this service for them.
No one in their right mind wishes to see Hampstead turn into a 24 hour drinkers’ ghetto, but a little extra leisure time in this context would not do anyone any harm.
Hopefully Mr Ely’s success may encourage other publicans who too have had their original applications for extended hours rejected, to lodge their own appeals.
John Graham
Daleham Gardens, NW3
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