Corby pub granted extension to opening hours despite neighbours' criticism of bid

The High Street venue can now open from 10am to 3am on Fridays and Saturdays with last orders for alcohol at 2am – and until midnight every other night – after North Northamptonshire Council’s (NNC) licensing panel approved their bid yesterday (Tuesday).

Co-owner Jeri McClintock read out an emotional statement outlining the pub’s difficult financial situation and their hopes to bring in more trade to keep the business afloat.

She said: “When we took up The White Hart our main goal was to create a family-run pub restaurant with a nice atmosphere that not only benefited the village and community but also became a nice place for us to raise our family. This continues to be our main goal.

“Our current financial situation finds us about six months away from closing our doors. This would mean 20 to 30 people out of a job, another restaurant shutting its doors and another local pub closing down.”

Ms McClintock said there have been offers made to purchase the property and turn it into houses in multiple occupation (HMOs).

She continued: “At this time this would be something I really wouldn’t want to consider as I can see this having a negative effect on the community. But, if we don’t do better in the next six months we may have no choice.

“We 100 per cent don’t want to upset our neighbours but we’re starting to feel like we’re being treated a little bit unfairly compared to the other pubs in Corby.

“I know there’s a growing concern that we want to turn The White Hart into a nightclub but that simply isn’t the case. We simply want to run a family-run business, but we are struggling to stay afloat.

“All I’m suggesting is that I’ve got the same opportunities as other businesses. If it’s not a nice atmosphere I will shut [before 3am], if it’s not busy I will shut [before 3am]. I don’t want to waste electric and staff wages if there’s nobody in.”

The pub’s bid received overwhelming public support on social media, but attracted criticism from people living locally who are worried about increased noise and anti-social behaviour.

A member of the public who lives across the road from the pub also attended the licensing meeting to oppose the longer opening hours, saying the noise late at night would be “horrendous”.

“The intermittent noise now from The White Hart in the early hours – shouting, laughing, arguing – affects my health. I cannot have a window open and expect to sleep if alcohol is to be served until 2am,” she told the meeting.

“I moved there eight years ago, I have happily lived there for six years – it’s a lovely place to live. But it hasn’t been happy, mostly to me, because of this music at the front all day.

“What residents hear is the boom boom of the bass and that scratchy tinny whiny sound of the treble combined with the road noise and it’s horrendous. It’s changed my life and lots of other residents who haven’t had the courage to come here and speak.

“We were so excited when we heard you were going to come [to start the pub] and we were hoping that the village would be lifted with a gastro-pub, not pulled down by a night economy.”

Under the pub’s current licence, live or recorded music can be played outside from 8am and must cease at 11pm. No change to this has been requested by The White Hart.

Rosina Howe, chair of the Corby Old Village Neighbourhood Association, also added: “Historically we had a really bad problem with a pub that was open to 3 o’clock in the morning. Unless you live with anti-social behaviour on a regular basis people don’t understand what it is.

“For example, on a Friday or Saturday night when these nightclubs were open until 3 o’clock in the morning when people were leaving, neighbours would wake up finding that there’s couples having sex in their garden, there’s people taking cocaine off the top of their wall.

“There’s exchanges of alcohol and drugs going on. Every single weekend these people were having to tolerate this behaviour. Our concern is a lot of the people living near the White Hart are elderly or vulnerable.

“We fully support the White Hart and we fully support them being open until 12 o’clock. But this all has effects on people’s mental health and we have a duty of care to people.”

NNC ultimately granted the extended hours licence after considering the representations made by the public, police and the owners.