Last orders: The Old Ox Inn, Shillingstone – ‘Now we’ve closed, our older clientele can’t socialise’

An oil painting of a cow looked at us sadly from the wall of the skittle alley at the Old Ox. The landlord, Shaun Hannam, made his career as a dairy farmer before running the pub.

Skittles are not an antiquarian interest in Dorset but a living enthusiasm. The local league pits the Antelope at Hazelbury Bryan against the Royal Oak at Okeford Fitzpaine or the Bird in Hand at Henstridge. Some pubs have several teams. The Old Ox had the Daddlers, the Drovers and the Oxtails.

But no more. The Old Ox, the only pub in the village of 1,110, shut up shop on February 11. As Shaun showed me how to bowl the six-inch ball at the fat-bellied skittles, the sound of them falling echoed emptily in the alley. He put on a brave face, but I was left with the impression that the closure of their pub had knocked him and his wife, Marcia, down like ninepins.

Shaun Hannam was born 63 years ago at Spetisbury, also on the River Stour, the other side of Blandford Forum. He built up his dairy herd and then opened a farm shop. This did well, and he opened a café and was granted an alcohol licence.

“I have always been self-employed,” he told me. “But the Government doesn’t want self-employed people.” His hair is neatly cut and he wears browline spectacles. He and his wife, Marcia, took on the Old Ox two and a half years ago. It is a free house, so they were not tied to a brewery or obliged to pay rent to a pub company.

The skittle alley at the Old Ox Inn, once home to three local teams Credit: Jeff Gilbert for The Telegraph

The whitewashed old building on the through road of the village, with its name painted on the gable, had a beer garden with a fine view over the Stour valley. It is on the North Dorset Trailway for walkers, cyclists and riders. Behind the medieval church, Shillingstone Station, closed in 1966 by the wicked Beeching cuts, is now maintained by enthusiasts.

On a rare sunny day this week, with a red kite wheeling in the blue sky and blossom blowing against the lichen-covered garden wall of the Old Rectory, this part of Dorset looked idyllic. But the finances had begun not to add up.

Shaun complained of rises in taxation, which The Telegraph has highlighted in its campaign to save Britain’s pubs. The Old Ox had a dining area which meant that, on a busy Sunday, 20 or 30 meals could be served. But VAT at 20 per cent, he said, made it harder for customers to afford a meal in a pub.

To serve food meant paying wages for a cook, which grew more expensive with increased employer National Insurance. Marcia helped with the cooking. “She ended up working 15-hour days,” Shaun said unhappily.

Energy costs became a heavy burden. They weren’t hit by the business rate increase, but only because of the small square footage of the pub. On top of everything, Shaun found it irksome to pay £450 for the PPL licence to play recorded music.

A pint of Hawkstone bitter was selling at the Old Ox for £6, the same as a pint of Guinness. That is the going rate in the area, and Shaun and Marcia couldn’t put the price up, or they’d have lost custom, nor could they put it down, or they’d have been making a loss. Villagers buy cheap alcohol from the Co-op, or even from the petrol station on the Blandford Road, and drink it at home without the benefit of sociable company.

The village mixed at the Old Ox. “If you see professional people drinking with builders and scaffolders, that’s a successful pub. But now we’ve closed, a lot of the older clientele can’t see their friends,” Shaun said. Marcia added: “They could afford to come in once a week or so. It was a social hub.”

Marcia kindly made me a cup of tea and sat at the table with her hands in her hair. We wore our outdoor coats in the chill bar. Marcia had a stylish scarf and a blue woollen bodywarmer. She doesn’t know what they will do now. She has commercial skills and worked for 20 years at a bank in Poole. Their dog, Rosie, aged four, padded into the empty bar room uncertainly, now that the place is empty.

They see the attraction now of working for someone else. “There’s too much paperwork and compliance for the self-employed,” Marcia said.

Shaun had heard customers say that the Government doesn’t want people congregating in pubs at all, because it can’t control what they say there. Other pubs nearby have closed: the Bull at Sturminster Newton and the Saxon at Child Okeford, across the valley. Shaun predicted: “The next 12 months are going to get even tougher for pubs.”

[Source: Daily Telegraph]