Village raises £440,000 to save last pub from sale

The sum was raised by a total of 420 shareholders over the last 10 weeks

Villagers hoping to save their last remaining pub by buying it have raised £440,000.

The Ickleton Lion, which is between Cambridge and Saffron Walden in Essex, opened as a pub in 1728, but closed and was put up for sale by Suffolk brewing giant Greene King in 2023.

The Ickleton Lionhearted group set up a community benefit society to try to buy the pub.

Its chairwoman Rachel Radford, who lives in the village, near Duxford, said: "We are in a good position to put an offer to Greene King and hopefully save it from potential future redevelopment."

She said the group was currently in negotiations with the agent selling the pub.

"The next step is to make an offer to Greene King and hopefully negotiate," she said.

"Then if we buy it, we have to refurbish it, and there is quite a lot of work to do."

According to Historic England the building dates from the 1700s

Greene King, based in Bury St Edmunds, cannot accept offers from anybody other than a community interest group before 24 September.

However, it could wait until after that date to accept a different offer.

The community group's money was raised by a total of 420 shareholders over the last 10 weeks.

Ickleton Lionhearted previously said every member "irrespective of their shareholding" would have an equal say in the running of the pub.

Fundraising ran for an extra two weeks than originally planned due to a "surge of last-minute support".

The group, called the Ickleton Community Pub Limited, said some donors were based overseas at places including Wisconsin in the US and Toronto, Canada.

Originally the group hoped to raise £450,000 and extended its campaign for two weeks, and now they have come to within £10,000 of that target.

A grant of £45,000 has also provided by the Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority, in partnership with charity Plunkett UK.

Ms Radford thanked those who supported the fundraiser and said they had demonstrated "the true power of community spirit".

"We hope it’s enough to secure the future of the pub and let the Lion roar again," she said.

The BBC has contacted Greene King for a statement.