Interest in context on "government pub rates". New tax scheme?
Pubs are dying. Have been for years. Many deaths were postponed because their taxes were reduced due to Covid. Those taxes are now returning to normal levels. This will result in a glut of deaths, as pubs that were just hanging on go under. The policy question is, basically, do we want to subsidize pubs because they're part of our national culture, even though we don't use them nearly as much as we used to?
"Does Britain really need?" has been responsible for the gutting of so much of what used to make Britain a nice place to live over the last 20 years. You can say she same about public libraries, local bus routes, civic architecture, arts funding, youth services, maintenance budgets. The damage has been incalculable.