Pub tenants to demonstrate outside Parliament demanding action against Global Mutual hedge fund

The Global Mutual Tenants Association, a group formed by the tenants of the 202 pubs owned by hedge fund Global Mutual, will march on Whitehall tomorrow to deliver a letter to Small Firms Minister Paul Scully demanding that pressure be put on Global Mutual to offer rent relief to tenants who have suffered during the Covid pandemic. Despite the pubs being closed and numerous representations being made to Global Mutual, they are still insisting that their pub tenants pay rent for the lockdown period.

Dave Mountford, speaking on behalf of the Association said, “Notwithstanding the support of the Forum of British Pubs, our very reasonable requests have been rebuffed and this multi-million-pound company continues to make unreasonable and unsustainable rental demands on businesses that have been severely damaged by COVID and lockdown.”

The intransigence of Global Mutual is particularly frustrating as the reasons for the original purchase of the Pubs lies directly as a result of the terms of the Pubs Code, for which the Small Firms Minister is responsible. The Pub Code was introduced in 2014, but applies only to the larger Pubco’s, of which Mutual Global is not one.

“We believe that the behaviour of Global Mutual makes it clear that the Pubs Code should include any business that owns Pubs, however large or small, as it is clear to us that one of the unintended consequences of the legislation was the sale of large groups of Pubs to property companies who only interest is the sale of the Pubs for maximum return, which would always be alternative use as a Pub.,” added Dave Mountford.

The tenants will first march to the offices of Global Mutual formally to hand over a letter on behalf of all the tenants affected once again requesting some form of rental relief, in the same way that some of the large Pubco’s have extended to their tenants.

They will then move to Parliament to hand over a letter to Paul Scully requesting his involvement, requesting that he both intervene in the Global Mutual negotiations, and looks to extend the Pubs Code beyond just the larger Pubco’s.

Notes for Editors:

For further details and a copy of the letter to Paul Scully, contact Dave Mountford:

0779 2198954

The demonstration, involving approximately 50 pub tenants will present at the Global Mutual offices at:

Global Mutual, 3rd Floor,, 43 -45 Dorset Street, London, W1U 7NA. at 11.15 to 11.45 on Wednesday 9 September

Followed by:

Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), 1 Victoria Street, London, SW1H 0ET at 12.30 to 1.00 on Wednesday 9 September


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