Yorkshire licensees claim harsh treatment by pub company Pubs 2B Inn

Licensees Brian and Pauline Parker and local residents are planning a protest outside their pub claiming they are being treated unfairly by pub company Pubs 2B Inn.

The couple had been given 28 days' notice to leave the pub, the Black Horse in Hillfield, North Yorkshire, on October 12 with the company claiming they are not committed to the pub. However, the licensees, who were placed in the pub after undertaking a training and placement through rogue recruitment firm Inn-Direct, claim they are being treated harshly by the Bradford-based pub company.

Mrs Parker said they were forced to consider taking on a private members club when the pub company failed to renovate the bedrooms it had promised them.

She said: "We didn't get anything in writing but we were told the rooms would be open by February 2006. We are struggling to make ends meet. But the support from the village is unbelievable."

Local residents are up in arms and have written letters to the company director Stephen Ford and a petition has been raised with hundreds of names. Mr Ford has refused to back down despite the numerous complaints. In a letter to one of the local residents he said: "We as a company feel it is not financially viable to continue subsidising their wages bill."

A spokeswoman at Pubs 2B Inn said: "Financially we can only do so much at the time. We do want to renovate the pubs. The licensees were offered the tenancy but refused it. They were never promised the bedrooms would be open by February."

Eddie McGhee, the director who has been struck off by the Department for Trade and Industry for his involvement in Inn-Direct, was until recently a director of Pubs 2B Inn, which operates out of the same offices as the Lonely Pub Company.

The licensees have been offered jobs running a local fish and chip shop and local residents have found them a place to live.