The ‘Hands of our Pubs’ campaign now has the backing of more than 500 hospitality businesses

A campaign by a pub landlord in the Forest of Dean for fairer treatment for hospitality businesses has gathered support from across the UK. The ‘Hands off our Pubs’ (Hoop) movement began last month when a group of landlords met up to discuss rising costs – and now more than 500 other businesses from around the country have joined.

On Wednesday, the campaign group held a summit at The Speech House, in Coleford, with speakers including Tony Sophoclides, strategic affairs director at UKHospitality and Julie Kent MBE, the High Sheriff of Gloucestershire. They were joined by hotel owners, café operators, tourism leaders and independent publicans to discuss the issues facing the industry.

At the heart of the discussion was the “growing disconnect” between government policy and how hospitality actually operates on the ground – particularly in rural and market-town Britain, where pubs are often the last remaining community infrastructure.

Mr Terry-Lush, co-founder of Hoop, said: “Most consumers have no idea how many new costs are being piled onto hospitality. Business rates, an alcohol duty hike, higher employment and environmental taxes, rising energy bills and food inflation are all landing at once – forcing prices up while margins collapse.

“At the same time, supermarkets continue to sell alcohol at wafer-thin margins that pubs cannot legally or commercially match. Community pubs cannot absorb this imbalance. They either pass on costs and lose customers, or close. That is the reality.”

‘This is no longer a local issue’

Last month, the government announced a 15 per cent discount on business rates for pubs and music venues after a backlash against Rachel Reeves’ Budget announcements in November. But the Hoop campaign is pushing for more support.

In a post on LinkedIn following the summit, Hoop wrote: “The mood was was determined as speaker after speaker described the same reality: busy venues, loyal customers, strong reputations – and margins quietly evaporating under VAT at 20 per cent, business rates calculated on theory not reality, rising employment costs and supermarket imbalance.

“Hospitality is economic infrastructure: it drives tourism, supports retail, employs young people, anchors villages and gives high streets a reason to exist. When it weakens, places weaken.

“The summit was about prevention, about turning frustration into organised influence. About moving from polite letters to coordinated action. The message leaving Speech House was clear: this is no longer a local issue. It is structural and national.”

The group is now taking its fight to Westminster.

A spokesperson for HM Treasury said the government was backing Britain’s pubs by “cutting their new business rates bills by 15 per cent, extending World Cup opening hours and increasing the Hospitality Support Fund to £10m to help venues grow.

The university spin-out’s retina business including its specialist team has been acquired – but all other jobs have been lost

Jobs have been saved at a Newcastle biotech business after part of the firm was bought out of administration in a partial rescue deal. Cambridge based Axol Bioscience Ltd, a leading provider of stem cell technologies for drug discovery and research, has announced it has acquired the ophthalmology business of Newcells Biotech, a drug discovery partner specialising in the development of in vitro models.

The business swooped for the retina business of Newcells Biotech – based in the Biosphere at Newcastle Helix – following the appointment of administrators at Grant Thornton LLP. The Newcastle University spin out specialises in providing in vitro tools for testing how drugs interact with tissues and was founded 11 years ago by Dr Mike Nicholds and Professor Lyle Armstrong.

The firm, which had 49 employees in 2024, focused on offering models of the retina, kidney and lung and it was also carrying out testing for customers. Use of 3D models attracted interest after the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) changed its rules four years ago, scrapping the requirement for new drugs to be tested on animals.

The Axol deal includes the specialist team, facilities and intellectual property within the retina division, specifically related to the supply of proprietary iPSC-derived (induced pluripotent stem cell) products and ophthalmology research services to biopharma, biotechnology and customers across Europe and the US. It’s not known how many staff members have transferred to Axol Bioscience, but 18 other jobs have been lost.

A spokesman for the company said: “On February 12, 2026, insolvency practitioners from Grant Thornton UK Advisory & Tax LLP were appointed as joint administrators of Newcells Biotech Limited. Following their appointment, the joint administrators agreed a sale of the Retina Business of the company as a going concern to Censo Biotechnologies Limited (trading as Axol Bioscience).

“The acquisition will ensure the operations of the Retina Business will continue at the main trading premises in Newcastle and secured the retention of all employees working within that part of the business. The remaining operations of the company ceased on appointment. As a result, it was not economically viable for the joint administrators to continue to employ the remaining members of staff resulting in 18 redundancies.”

Newcells Biotech announced two significant funding rounds during 2024 to expand its work. The investments – including £2.35m in February and £1.2m in May – aimed to help the business build its customer base and develop partnerships with other companies in its field.

Meanwhile, Axol said the acquisition expands its portfolio of models, and also strengthens its position as the leading independent provider of physiologically-relevant in vitro retinal models for ophthalmology drug discovery and safety testing. Axol recently announced a $2.8m financing deal, led by US life sciences investor BroadOak Capital Partners, which is supporting expansion of its US commercial operations, product development and manufacturing scale-up.

Liam Taylor, CEO of Axol Bioscience, said: “The addition of Newcells’ retinal organoid business is our third acquisition in five years.

He added: “Newcells has developed a highly sophisticated and scalable retinal organoid platform focused on predictive, human-relevant iPSC-derived retinal models that are recognised across the industry. Integrating this capability with Axol’s existing ophthalmology portfolio enables us to offer a broader, more physiologically relevant toolkit to support research.”