Publicans around north Kent were remaining grimly determined this afternoon in the face of further restrictions imposed by the government.

New rules announced by the prime minister state pubs, bars, restaurants and other hospitality venues in England must have a 10pm closing time from Thursday, and will be restricted by law to offering table service only to help curb the spread of coronavirus.

Peter Kray, manager of The Crown in Rochester High Street, said pubs would need to accept the rules if they wanted to keep their businesses going - but said many had slipped back into serving customers at the bar since reopening in July.

"You've got to stay safe to stay open," he said. "If we want to keep our jobs we have to listen to what the government says and stick to it.

"We've been doing table service only since we opened, but not everywhere has along this high street. We've also had masks made available for all staff.

"A lot of other pubs have been doing bar service but we thought the safest way to operate was table service.

"I think so far it's created a much more civilised environment where people are sitting down, so it's more set up for food.

"Now it's more like being abroad - table service is better service."

As for the new 10pm closing rule, he said the impact remained to be seen.

"It is what it is," he added. "If that's what the government think will work then we'll do it. If we want to stay open we have to adhere to the guidelines."

Over at the Wig and Gown in Spital Street, Dartford, co-owner Alan Pulfer said they too had continued to operate table service since reopening after lockdown.

But he said the new 10pm closing time would have a big impact on his pub and others with a late licence that had a significant amount of trade after 10pm on weekend.

"It doesn't make much difference during the week because we close at 11pm so it's just one hour, but the biggest thing will be at the weekend, because on a Friday we can close between 12 and 2am."

"There's so many issues we don't know what to do. It's going to have a big impact financially because we get a lot of our trade after 10pm on a weekend.

"It's going to affect us a lot but we will try to build on our day trade and food deliveries. We're going to try to push food as much as possible.

"We have been busy and were picking up more trade until the last couple of weeks, when they dropped the table sizes down to six.

"We're worried. Me and my friend run a hospitality Facebook group and a lot of people are worried on there."

At The Three Daws in Gravesend, owner Lester Banks was less worried, but remained frustrated over the government's handling of the announcement.

He said the pub was "firmly locked into" offering table service, and that many people had been leaving earlier anyway, having generally arrived to eat between 7pm and 8pm."

But he added: "There are uncertainties. We don't know what we will do with prebooked weddings - which they said could be down to 15 people

"I think 10pm is a little bit too early. I can't see there's a great deal of benefit to closing one hour early, although I can understand they may not want people going out after 12 when when they might start to forget about social distancing rules.

"We've got a wedding booked for Saturday which was 30 people but might have to be 15. We haven't got chapter and verse yet - they're always so slow bring it out so we don't know what to do half the time.

"I'm not worried - we just take it our stride and carry on. It will be strange shutting at ten on a Saturday."

He suspected people might start coming out earlier in the evening or afternoon, but joked: "I always go out at 9pm so I'll have to come home half an hour later."

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