Petty council killjoys just want to make our lives miserable

Telegraph

06-06-2025

There is no more chilling a phrase in hospitality than 'enforcement notice'. The very nature of it – formal and aggressive – bearing the assumption of wrongdoing, of guilt and of culpability in ghastly misdeed.
Thus, such an envelope was waiting on the bar for Vasil Vasilev, manager of the Trafalgar Tavern in Greenwich, when he arrived for work one morning recently at the 188-year-old pub. And what dastardly infringement was the establishment in breach of? He was pretty sure there were no roaches in the kitchen and no rodents nibbling at the carpets. The place was noisy, but no more than usual.
The Trafalgar, which opened in the year of Queen Victoria's succession, is on the banks of the River Thames. And by the iron balustrade, overlooking the sandy banks of the river, on the cobbled streets beside the pub, are pub benches and umbrellas. And it's this seating that has stirred Greenwich council into crafting its officious missive.
The planning inspectorate has ordered the pub to stop using the land for drinking and dining and demanded that all seats, tables and umbrellas be removed.
This, in spite of the cobbled area of the Thames Path known as the 'ramp and knuckle' being leased to the pub's landlord Frank Dowling by the Greenwich Foundation, for which he pays an annual rent and having, he claims, signed a formal agreed with Greenwich Council in 2005 to use the space under what is known as a 'Section 16 arrangement'.
'It's just ridiculous,' said Mr Vasilev. 'We are not blocking pedestrian access – there's plenty of room.'
He adds that there are three to four metres of space and as folk drink, there's a familiar sight of joggers passing and mothers pushing prams. On a warm day, customers spill out onto the ramp and knuckle, and admittedly, on a very busy day, it can be a bit of a squeeze for passers-by to navigate the merry throng. But the world kept turning. Until a council killjoy received an email or letter, which is the sort of thing that gets them up in the morning: a complaint.
It only takes one complaint for a council bod to get fire in the belly, a rush of adrenaline through the veins. So, doubtless by lunchtime, they'd hit upon that slam-dunk reasoning that the seating was restricting access for emergency vehicles. Add to that the glorious words of 'people in wheelchairs and the elderly' and they had their unarguable case. As the council puts it: 'There are planning policies in place that we need to follow.'
The message being: pubgoers might be having fun, but lives are in danger. So while thousands of people have used and continue to use the ramp and knuckle and with very few, if any, lives lost thus far, a handful of grumbles see the heavy wheels of the council turning: ahead is pleasure, and it must be crushed.
And such is the state of our planning system; such is the demonic power-hungry appetite of a fevered council official, that the miserable few get to lord it over the benign majority.
As Somerset Council recently wrecked the Milverton Street Fair, citing safety, so their Greenwich comrades seek to destroy some Victory IPA-fuelled fun in a little old patch of southeast London.
Using some unorthodox tactics and against the odds, Horatio Nelson won his great battle of 1805, albeit losing his life in the process. Let's hope with rather less bloodshed this battle of Trafalgar also sees the right side triumph. And as to tactics for Commanders Dowling and Vasilev, they might heed what Nelson once advised one Captain Thomas Cochran: 'Never mind manoeuvres, always go at them.'