Village gets keys to pub after raising £440,000

Pippa Heylings, the Liberal Democrat MP for South Cambridgeshire, was at a celebration at the pub on Sunday

Residents have been celebrating after getting the keys to the last remaining pub in their village by raising £440,000 to save it.

The Ickleton Lion, which is between Cambridge and Saffron Walden in Essex, opened as a pub in 1728, but 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 in their village.

After 10 weeks of fundraising, the group was handed the keys on Friday and will now begin renovations and repairs, hoping to have it open in mid-2025.

The community group's money was raised by 415 shareholders, which included £52,300 from the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority in partnership with charity Plunkett UK.

The pub was a popular haunt for US airmen in World War Two. It served scientists from the Wellcome Genome Campus and cyclists along Route 11 in more recent years.

The villagers - some of whom are pictured outside the pub earlier this year - raised more than £400,000

Chulyal White said everyone was "looking to see" how they could help get the pub running again

Chulyal White, who has lived near Ickleton for five years, said she remembered when The Lion was the "heart and soul" of the village.

"We were shocked to hear that it was closing but now it's reopening, we're looking forward to more good times here," said Ms White, who was at the pub on Sunday to take a first look inside.

"We're all looking to see how we can help."

Rachel Radford, chair of the community group, said the pub would always be a welcoming place

Rachel Radford, chair of the community group, said when The Lion does reopen people will see "a cosy, warm, welcoming pub serving good drinks and good food - relatively simple food - but good pub food, and a fantastic welcome".

"Anybody will feel comfortable walking in here - whether they're on their own - because we've got a quarter of the people living in the village who do live on their own and we want it to be somewhere where they just feel comfortable coming in, and somebody will say hello to them."

Pippa Heylings, the Liberal Democrat MP for South Cambridgeshire, described the fundraising effort as "incredible"

Pippa Heylings, the Liberal Democrat MP for South Cambridgeshire, was at the gathering and celebration on Sunday.

"We've just got to do everything we can to make sure communities can be together around special community hubs like this," she said.

She described the fundraising effort as "just incredible".

Patrick Watson, an Ickleton resident and project manager who has volunteered to oversee the repairs and refurbishment of The Lion, said: "It's great to end 2024 on a high with such a festive celebration, but we have a long wish list for Father Christmas this year.

"The building survey has highlighted urgent repairs needed to the roof and we need a new kitchen too.

"Luckily, the community is delivering once again and we've had over 100 offers of free support from local people and tradespeople to get us to our first opening night in the pub rather than the car park."