Pub closure on hold to allow VE Day celebrations

A PUB scheduled for closure on Sunday has been given a week's reprieve so its customers can celebrate VE Day before it finally shuts its doors.

- BY BILL JACOBS LOCAL DEMOCRACY REPORTING SERVICE

The Hare and Hounds in Whalley Road, Clayton-le-Moors, was scheduled to cease trading by owners Thwaites Brewery on May 4.

But now the company's director of pubs and brewing Andrew Buchanan has told Hyndburn Council's deputy leader Cllr Noordad Aziz the deadline has been put back a week.

This will allow the pub, which is the subject of a major campaign to save it from closure, to celebrate VE Day on Thursday May 8 which marks the end of the Second World War in Europe and the date of the surrender of Nazi Germany.

The Friends of the Hare and Hounds campaign has raised a petition with hundreds of signatures calling for it to be saved.

Mr Buchanan told Cllr Aziz: "We have spoken to our operator at The Hare and Hounds (Paul and Clare) and agreed with them that they will remain in situ over VE day.

"The plan is now that the pub remains trading until Sunday 11."