A FORMER Dorset pub has been re-classified as ‘residential’ after being not calling last orders for more than a decade.

Dorset Council planners have accepted the change of use for the Ship Inn at Langton Matravers.

Evidence presented to them showed that attempts to market the business as a going concern over the years had met with almost no response and, to make it more difficult to re-open,  all the pub fittings had been stripped out – making a return to being a pub even less likely.

A commercial property consultant told the Council that the pub had been marketed since May 2015 and although there had been a number of inquiries there had been no desire by anyone to re-open the property as a public house.

The pub was last open in March 2013, with almost all of the pub equipment removed in 2014. In 2016 the Valuation Office reduced the non-domestic rates payable because there was good evidence it was no longer in commercial use.

The building previously had a landlord’s flat and three letting rooms.

Langton Matravers Parish Council had objected to the change of use from pub to residential and has said it would like to be told why there had been a lack of planning proposals, or change of use application, over the past ten years.

Pic – The Ship Inn in 2019. Google.