The Clarkson Arms: yes, I’ve bought a pub (full of dead rats)

Clarkson paid “less than £1 million” for The Windmill, formerly a wedding and banqueting venue set in five acres of countryside near Burford, Oxfordshire. He plans to renovate it and change its name

There are two ways the price negotiations go as well. They say they want a million. You offer them £17.50, and they either say “yes”, or they say “er, let me think, yes”.

So why, in the face of such overwhelming evidence that pubs are no longer viable, did I persevere? As one friend put it: “Owning a pub these days is even more daft than owning a farm. What’s next? You buying a cinema?” But there’s something inside a man that causes him to think, when he has
the means, it’d be nice to buy the village boozer.

Obviously, I couldn’t buy my village boozer. The locals would set fire to me if I did that. But the idea wouldn’t go away. I dreamt, as many men have dreamt in the past, of chatting with the regulars about nothing of any consequence and then having a Sunday roast with my family at my own table on a Sunday. And then not paying. That’s the sentimental reasoning. “Yeah,” said another friend who left his job in advertising to open a pub, “I thought that. But most nights I was mopping the lavatories because some kid hadn’t turned up.”

In my case, however, there was more to it. I had failed to get planning permission to turn a barn on my farm into a restaurant, but I still wanted somewhere where I could sell all that we make here. And my own beer in the taps too.

Clarkson plans to inject a sense of “fun” into his drinking establishment, which will have bar billiards, dominoes and darts. The food will be inspired by 1970s Yorkshire: “shepherd’s pie and egg and chips”. He will sell produce reared on his own farm, as well as his own Hawkstone lager.

I also wanted a room I could turn into a clubhouse, which, on wet weekdays, would provide a mental health forum and a free pint for the nation’s farmers. I wanted dogs and families round the fire. And a restaurant where absolutely everything had been grown or reared in Britain. Even the salt, pepper and
wine. I had even decided there’d be no coffee or Coca-Cola.

I just needed the pub where all this could happen, and then, after I’d looked at about 14,000, I found just the place. Old, Cotswoldy and sitting in five acres of its own land. So I did a deal and then discovered that there was a famous dogging site in the area. Photographs from inside the nearby lavatories showed holes in the cubicle walls, strong pornography on the floor and evidence of enthusiastic consumption of the drugs made at the first pub I’d considered.

So I went to see West Oxfordshire district council, expecting no help at all, and, blow me down, it was very happy to close the dogging site. So I was in business. My dream would become a reality. All I needed was a bar person and someone who could rustle up some gammon, egg and chips, and I’d be away.

Clarkson with his girlfriend, Lisa Hogan. Everything served at the new pub will be grown in the UK to support local farmers, which means coffee and Coca-Cola will be off the menu

DAVID M BENETT/GETTY IMAGES

Hahahahahahahaha. I’ve learnt since I signed on the dotted line that a pub of this size is going to need a general manager and an operations director and a bar manager and, because there will be shifts, maybe 80 people on the payroll. And I’m told that everyone suitable is now in Poland or Italy, thanks to Brexit. Except the people I’ll need to run something called the human resources department. They’re still here.

But before I start the hunt for these people, there is some work to be done on the pub itself. For example, the cellar is too small, the gable end is falling down, the outside decking area is dangerous, the water is unfit for human consumption, the loft is full of dead rats and the lavatories are illegal.
And I can’t start work on any of these things now because when I bought the pub, I inherited a long-standing commitment to a young couple who, in a couple of weeks’ time, are having their wedding reception there.

Farmers will be entitled to a free pint. Clarkson will sell his own Hawkstone lager as well as produce reared on Diddly Squat Farm

ALAMY

It’s entirely possible that I won’t get the place mended and open until the icy hand of winter has descended, which means I’ll have 80 people to pay every week, a quagmire for a car park and no customers because — as I’ve been told time and again — people just don’t go to country pubs any more. I think there are good reasons for that. Some have three locals at the bar who stare at you when you walk in, and some are full of octogenarians complaining that the carrots haven’t been cooked for long enough before going home at 8.30pm. Fun is in short supply, and fun is what I want to put back. There will be bar billiards, there will be darts and in the garden there will be Aunt Sally, even though I’m not entirely certain what Aunt Sally is.

And in the corner there will be a table with my name on it. A place where I can go on a Sunday with my granddaughter for some gammon, egg and chips. Well-priced, British-grown food with a pint of Hawkstone beer. And a warm fuzzy feeling inside.

Except for one small but annoying detail. I’ve just received word from my doctor that my liver is a bit stiff and that I really need to quit drinking for a while.

What should Jeremy Clarkson call his pub? Tell us in the comments below