A budget for pub closures

George Osborne today announced that there will be "no change" in beer duty. A brief cheer went around the beerati on Twitter, but many forgot about the Duty Escalator, introduced by the previous Government, which will put inflation plus 2% on the price of a pint. So thats a 7.5% rise on a pint from Sunday, working out at around an extra 20p on a pint.
There is more to come as beers above 7% ABV will be taxed at a higher rate so some great award-winning beers from brewers such as Otley and Brewdog will cost more whilst 2% ABV cans of supermarket swill will be taxed less, despite their lower quality ingredients used and lower production costs than hand crafted ales.
All in all this is another budget that will do nothing to stem the pub closures now running at 25 a week.

SCRAP THE ESCALATOR AND SAVE THE PUB!