Pub equals Happinness?

Evening,

    I was reading in widely reviled fascist chip wrapper free rag Metro that the village of Mayfield in East Sussex could not apply for lottery funding because against the Office for National Statistics measure of need the village's residents were too happy, with a rating of need of 75%, or surely more logically 25%.

Obviously this has caused consternation to the Fortesque Humphingtons and the village squire but what's perhaps most interesting is the reported benchmark the lottery set in describing a village with almost no needs :

" Mayfield can hardly be described as 'deprived'. Prices for many four- and five-bedroom houses start at £850,000 and it has a butcher, baker, chemist, greengrocer, bank, post office and Catholic independent school."

Apart from the maudlin presence of a religious school, what is notable here is the absence of a village pub! the Post office butcher and baker seem like good and indeed rare facilities these days, but always assuming everything is listed, what kind of village is happy without a pub?

A commuter prevalent one maybe? (am looking at you, Sellattyn in Shropshire!)

I personally can't think of anything worse, although, of course, that doesn't mean the village is any more needy in terms of funding.

The other interesting fact about this, and perhaps one that better demonstrates the newspaper and Lottery organisations inability to recognise the importance of pubs, is that according to Wikipedia here the village has three pubs - the Middle House, Rose and Crown and Carpenters.

Surely supporting the N.A.O assessment of their low level of need...

Wee Beefy