Pub closures in Portsmouth: How this alarming trend has grown in recent years

In January last year it was announced that The Battle of Minden in St Mary’s Road, Kingston, would be closing down.

The landlord, Ray Shaw, said that he had been struggling to cope due to the low price of alcohol available in supermarkets.

He said at the time: ‘Trade is not as it used to be; it’s the same with many back street pubs because of the competition from supermarkets.’

On October 30 last year, The Mr Pickwick in Milton Road closed permanently.

The lease had been put up for sale in October 2016, after building up a reputation of being a well-loved community pub that was frequented by football fans on match days.

Looking further afield, The Curlew in Petersfield Road, Havant, was sold last year, with the site being turned into 31 homes.

Much like the Royal Marine Artillery Tavern, the site was sold off by Fuller’s.

Landlord Mary Sinclair said: ‘We have seen hundreds of memories come to pass in this place, so we are very sad to see it go.’

Back in 2014, popular student pub The Registry closed its doors, with the pub owners saying that the venue was no longer turning a profit.

Manager Andy Quildan said: ‘Unfortunately when the students aren’t here we don’t make enough money and recently there has been much speculation about whether we were closing down, which has put people off from coming here as they didn’t know if we were open or not.’