I read about the efforts of campaigners to save The Rose Hill Tavern – all very laudable.

As a publican of a very successful pub, The Stanley Arms, and as the freeholder may I offer the following view.

We put down our life savings as a deposit and raised a mortgage to purchase the pub in 2002.

Since that time we have put more and more money into the pub to ensure we offered a good environment, and a safe place for the community to come and have a drink and relax in.

We have won Camra pub of the year eight times and opened our first micro pub in Lancing, The Stanley Ale House, so we are pub people, not property speculators.

My wife and myself are both in our 60s and not in the best of health. It’s time now for us to sell the pub and relax a bit.

The pub shows healthy profits. We put it on the market. We thought we would have no problem in selling the pub as a going concern. Not so.

Nobody seems to want to risk buying a pub these days and risking their capital. Therefore if no one wants it as a pub I will sell to a developer.

I am just an individual, not a massive property company, like Punch or Enterprise.

I would love this old pub to stay as a pub.

Steve Bennett The Stanley Arms Wolseley Road Portslade