The UK is known for three things: our monarchy, daily cups of tea and pubs.
And in the last 25 years, the UK has lost both the Queen and around 2,500 of our trusty pubs (although tea is very much still being drunk).
British pubs are central to how our country operates, serving as a marker of community spirit that can unite an area lacking in cohesion.
A simple pub quiz, karaoke evening or just a Friday night pint with the football on can be the highlight of someone’s week. Starting young, a classic British childhood is normally painted with evenings hoovering up crisps and guzzling fizzy drinks under the table as parents chat away with friends.
Besides their own home, bars or pubs were voted the most popular location to spend time with friends, with more than one in three claiming it is their predominant place.
However, year by year, the number of pubs are decreasing and since 2000, we have lost 26% of our pubs and the heaves of Londoners heading to their local pub after a day in the office is going in the same direction.
The British Beer and Pub Association agree that pubs are a cornerstone of British heritage and has been striving to minimise closures since launching its ‘Long Live the Local’ campaign in 2018.
However, as our social pubs are dwindling in numbers, the levels of loneliness are creeping up as a wave of disconnect within communities takes its toll.
Psychologist Dr John Cacioppo said: “Loneliness is not a pathology. It’s just an external signal from our body that something is going wrong with our environment.”
The new data from the UK Spirits Alliance confirms what we’re all taught from a young age as Brits: the pub is much more than a place to purely buy a drink.
The poll showed nearly two thirds of the public believe pubs play an important role in addressing loneliness and social isolation.
Neema Rai, owner of Tamesis Dock in London said: “Pubs aren’t just about serving drinks, they’re about serving our communities. For many of our regulars, the pub is where friendships are formed and where people look out for each other.
“From maintaining a varied drinks offering to fostering a sense of community spirit, it’s time we recognised pubs for more than pints.
“With excise duty rises and soaring costs, pubs are fighting for survival. Every closure means another community loses its heart. Our locals are lifelines, not luxuries.”
Although loneliness had already been rising in the years before the pandemic, driven in part by the steady decline in the number of pubs since 2000, the pandemic period is widely reported to have had an impact on all social areas.
Lockdowns left people confined to their homes, exaggerating feelings of isolation, while pubs suffered as social bubbles and in-person gatherings were banned, forcing many establishments to close their doors.
This data suggests the reduction in our prime social spaces has been a central contributor to the UK’s loneliness epidemic, significantly dented by the pandemic where businesses shut down and social anxiety became rife.
In 2022, just after the height of the pandemic, 700,000 Londoners admitted to feeling lonely almost all of the time and, strikingly, 12% of those claimed the lack of boozers was a factor.
Milly Baltazar, 26, tells us that as her local pub shut down, she felt the community began to seem more and more isolated.
Baltazar said: “As soon as the pub closed, we were all thinking ‘where do we go now?’. Some of the locals we would bump into at the pub disappeared and we haven’t seen them since.
“Lots of people rely on the pub as a place to meet friends and socialise so without the pub, we lost that social connection.”
The financial impact of covid and the cost of living crisis have all contributed to the local watering holes drying up.
The shrinking pub map has consequences that go far beyond a lack of pints, deepening mental health issues and corroding communities.
A recent Gov.uk study showed that one in three people say they or someone they know has felt lonelier or more isolated as a direct result of pubs closing down.
London is beginning to look more and more bleak with the cost of living crisis contributing to more expensive drinks and fewer owners who can afford to keep their locals running.
With a challenging future ahead, the BBPA are continuing their campaign to ensure that British pubs are not wiped from the UK’s future.
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