AN AWARD-winning brewery and beer hall in a South Lakeland village has been shut down.

The community in Staveley is in ‘shock’ after vans turned up on Tuesday to begin removing stock and ‘ripping out’ the bar at Hawkshead Brewery.

Residents who live nearby reported vans turning up without notice to the bar staff.

Staff at the business, owned by Halewood Artisanal Spirits, were issued with redundancy notices on September 4 and the expected closure date was September 22.

Halewood said production was being transferred to its Flookburgh site and staff have been offered jobs there.

The business moved to Mill Yard in Staveley in 2006 and has been credited with boosting tourism in the village.

(Image: Mel Connell)

Staveley resident Mel Connell said staff were upset as stock was taken from the brewery and pumps were drained with pump heads disconnected and removed. 

Mel said: "The staff and community planned to share the goodbye together. This has been taken away in the most heartless and inappropriate way with no regard whatsoever for the staff, customers or community. 

"A fantastic group of staff, who are locals, are being made redundant and the community of all ages is losing a heart.

(Image: Mel Connell)

"It is like family to so many of us. A place to drink, meet, talk through good times and bad and be entertained. Today is heartbreaking. The loss to our community is beyond words.

"Friends of locals who drink here consider it their local away from home.

"People coming to the brewery use other businesses in the Millyard/Staveley and the economic knock-on of the closure will be far-reaching. 

"Many people also visit Staveley specifically for its bars and pubs and the closure of the brewery will impact on tourism in the local area. 

"Most of the staff and many locals are here today. What is very clear is the friendship and love for each other and the brewery and the absolute shock, anger and sadness at what's going on."

(Image: Mel Connell)

MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale Tim Farron said: "This is incredibly sad. I'm appalled at Halewood's poor treatment of staff, for betraying the heritage of the brand and the brewery, and deserting the community that has underpinned their success for two decades.

"On the positive side the premises they've abandoned is a fantastic opportunity for a local business to move into to employ local people and thrive."

Former Hawkshead Brewery employee Adam Jamieson, who worked at the bar around five years ago, went to the site today to comfort his friend and manager of the bar.

He said: "She's absolutely devastated, they all are. This was last minute, there was no communication and the bar has been ripped up.

"They wanted to have their farewell to locals and that's been taken away from them.

"There are people who come in by train and bus and there's ample free parking. Every week a gentleman travels from Manchester.

"Every Sunday older people visit and they were planning to come this weekend to say bye - there's no chance of that now.

"Everyone has been treated like a number on a piece of paper with no thought of the impact on the community - it's disgusting."

A spokesperson for Halewood: “Hawkshead is expanding our award winning beer brands into national grocery with recent wins for Windermere Pale Ale.

"In order to be competitive on price we need to utilise our larger “state of the art” Krones Beer Line at our owned production site in Flookburgh, Cumbria.

"The old small Brewery pub site at Staveley is leased and is not sustainable from an energy and efficiency point of view with manually operated equipment which will be unable to cope with the increased volumes.

"In addition, we have renewed and increased the size of our delivery fleet of vehicles for our cask and keg business to allow a greater service outside of the Cumbria area.

"The Brewery staff are being offered the possibility to relocate to the larger site which is 20 miles away which will also produce Crabbies Ginger Beer and Bankhall British whisky.

"The Staveley Hawkshead Bar is also leased and is no longer profitable to operate due to the landlord applying new parking charges which has deterred customers, this will result in four permanent full time redundancies.

"Halewood intends to invest in Hawkshead Beer to be available on Keg in our own Distillery Bars in Liverpool, London and Bristol.

"All the core Hawkshead Beers will continue to be produced from Cumbria and we expect a smooth transition over to the Flookburgh site that has produced Hawkshead beers in the past."