A pub at the centre of a planning battle between its owner and the council is to be put on the market again – sparking a six-month window for the community to bid to buy it.
Charlie Southall has informed Brighton and Hove City Council he intends to put the Montreal Arms on the market.
And because residents successfully applied to have it designated as an asset of community value, this means the sale cannot happen until they’ve had a chance to raise the money to buy it.
A notice has been put up outside the pub to publicise the sale. It says Mr Southall notified the council on 23 September of his intention to sell the freehold.
This started a six-week period in which community interest groups can write to the council to asking to be considered as a potential bidder, with a deadline of 3 November.
If nobody applies, the sale can go ahead unhindered. If anyone applies, this triggers a six-month moratorium on the sale to give the group the chance to raise money to make a bid by 22 March next year.
However, Mr Southall would not have to accept any bid – even if it exceeds other offers, or no other offers have been made.
This is the second time the pub has been put on the market since being made an ACV. The first time, the council did not publicise the fact it had been informed, and no expressions of interest were made.
However, the pub – which was being marketed by Savills with offers of more than £425,000 invited – did not sell and was subsequently taken back off the market.
The pub has not been listed for sale on any of the main commercial property portals online, including Savills.
Mr Southall bought it for £420,000 in March 2022. The following month, he started ripping off its green tiles, despite pledging he had no plans to do so just weeks before.
The council issued a stop notice, and then an enforcement notice requiring him to replace them.
Company accounts filed since then said the enforcement action and its registration as an asset of community value (ACV) had lowered its value to an estimated £150,000.
The council eventually launched a prosecution for failing to comply with the notice. However, a planning inspector subsequently ruled the council had been unreasonable in refusing to allow him to remove all the remaining tiles before replacing them.
A crown court judge then asked the council to explain why it had not halted the prosecution at that point – after which the council withdrew its case.
The judge then ruled the prosecution had been unreasonable and ordered the council to pay Mr Southall’s costs.
Part of the back of the pub has since been knocked down, in line with planning permission to restore the pub granted in 2024. No other visible work has been done.
It will never be a pub again. Knock it down and build some housing.
Buy it, try it, see what the Council thinks of YOUR idea based on YOUR money.
Build affordable housing for special needs families ok benefits and migrants that don’t have homes
Shut up.
People watch a bit of homes under the hammer and suddenly think they are Fred trump… Hopefully once it’s sold this guy can scuttle back to the rock from which he came out from underneath.
I have to comment here, because I lived directly opposite this pub for over 30 years.
It was never a great pub, and, despite the changes in licensing laws and the smoking ban, it never turned a big profit.
It also had four other pubs on the same road, Albion Hill, as competition – three of which have also closed down.
There are simply too many pubs in the Hanover area to match modern drinking habits.
So the Montreal Arms will never be a pub again, not even if some naive locals club together to buy it, as a community base
If you are a Hanover resident you’ll know there are already too many pubs in this residential area, arguably way more than the modern lifestyle can maintain.
That truth laid bare, I also understand this was and is a building of historical importance, and this Charlie character should yet be made to replace the tiles.
For sure, this old building may end up being a single house, or as flats, but that final outcome should still reflect the warm heritage of the area. It was those green tiles that made it special.
Even without the tiles as an issue, I doubt that anyone will pay £400k for a building that needs so much work to change it into modern accommodation.
Let’s not forget the stinging criticism B and H council came in for in respect of the manner in which they handled the planning application. I am no fan of people who ignore conservation issues but in this instance the tiles had to be removed to carry out intrusive inspections to the structure; as advised by consultant structural engineers. Tim Rowkins came in for particularly damning criticism which is unsurprising after the other debacle with the poorly thought through, ‘Cosy Killer’ campaign about wood burners that the advertising standards authority forced them to remove. There may be different outcomes with such issues if there were fewer, amateur, headline grabbing councillors in this city.
Shut up.
It’s simple.
4 years ago a man called Charlie Southall created an eyesore. His team gouged and chipped into a protected, tiled façade.
When stopped, he left it bare and decaying.
We have lived with this ugly ruin for 4 years.
It insults our eyes everyday as we pass.
Mr Southall has done such damage to this community that any reasonable person would consider it criminal.
This and only this concerns me. Later I’ll want the subsequent structure to compliment it’s srroundings but right now…. I only want Mr Southall to suffer SOME punishment for the graffitied, broken, bombsite we’ve endured for over 4 years and, for which, he alone is responsible.