Best smoking area? No thanks!
Wednesday, May 25, 2011 at 9:00
Simon Clark

Our search for the pub with the best smoking area has suffered a setback.

Following an appeal to friends of Forest, supporters of the Save Our Pubs & Clubs campaign, and readers of this blog, we received an encouraging number of nominations and some warm comments.

The next step was to write to the landlords, inviting them to complete and return the official nomination form, which they had to sign.

So far so good. Unfortunately very few recipients returned the form by the closing date, so this week, with the deadline extended to May 27, I asked a colleague to chase them up.

Some licensees responded positively but several said they didn't want to receive an award for Best Smoking Area. One landlord – a belligerent Australian – went even further.

"Best Smoking Area?" he raged. "I'm bigger than that." Pause. "You get me?"

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