Hunger strike publican gets a date for his eviction

A publican who went on hunger strike in a coffin to protest against his eviction will leave his pub in dramatic style on the 11th day of the 11th month at 11am.

Colm Powell has arranged a horse-drawn hearse to remove him from his Enterprise Inns pub The Punch & Judy, in Tonbridge, Kent, in the coffin.

"Enterprise have done this and now hey will see me removed in a coffin" said Colm. "But I've done my dying bit - it's now about a campaign to save the dying pub trade."

Once evicted from both the Punch and Judy and his other nearby pub, the Ivy House, Colm plans to make the coffin mobile.

"I'm going to take the coffin around the country in a Winnebago visiting and raising publicity for the hundreds of other pubs which are facing similar problems" he said.

Colm blamed "exorbitant rents" and expensive beer prices charged by his landlord Enterprise Inns for his demise.

However Enterprise previously said he had breached the terms of his agreement with them leaving the company "no alternative but to seek possession of the pubs involved"