A nationwide pub chain with a branch in Newtown has posted record losses for the past year.

Announcing its preliminary results, the JD Wetherspoon group, which operates the Black Boy on Broad Street in Newtown, announced pre-tax losses of £154 million after seeing like-for-like sales fall by nearly 40% over the past 12 months.

The results mean that the group is expected to post an operating loss of £109.3m, against a £3.8m profit at the same point in 2020.

Commenting on the results, Tim Martin, the Chairman of J D Wetherspoon plc, said pressure on pubs and their staff had been "acute" during the pandemic, and said the "draconian" lockdown measures had hit the industry disproportionately.

"In the last year, the country moved, in succession, from lockdown, to ‘Eat Out to Help Out’, to curfews, to firebreaks, to pints with a substantial meal only, to different tier systems and to further lockdowns," he said.

"During the pandemic, the pressure on pub managers and staff has been particularly acute, with a number of nationwide and regional pub closures and reopenings, often with very little warning, each of which resulted in different regulations.

"Pub management teams, and indeed the entire hospitality industry, had an almost impossible burden in trying to communicate often conflicting and arbitrary rules to customers."

The group said recruiting had remained steady throughout the last year, with an increase in the total number of employees from 39,025 in the financial year, which increased to 42,003 for the week ending

September 20.

"On average, Wetherspoon has received a reasonable number of applications for vacancies, as indicated by the increase in employee numbers, but some areas of the country, especially “staycation” areas in the West Country and elsewhere, have found it hard to attract staff," added Mr Martin.

"In more than 50 million customer visits, recorded in the second half of 2020, before the introduction of vaccines, Wetherspoon had zero outbreaks of the virus, as defined by the health authorities, among customers.

"Yet there has clearly been a high level of transmission in some other environments, including private parties, weddings, production facilities, university halls of residence and homes.

"Pubs have been at the forefront of business closures during the pandemic, at great cost to the industry - but at even greater cost to the Treasury.

"In spite of these obstacles, Wetherspoon is cautiously optimistic about the outcome for the financial year, on the basis that there is no further resort to lockdowns or onerous restrictions.

"The biggest threat to the pub industry, and also, inter alia, to restaurants, theatres, cinemas, airlines and travel companies, relates to the precedent set by the government for the use of lockdowns and draconian restrictions, imposed under emergency powers.

"This threat, which is also a threat to civil society and democracy, has been regularly articulated by many commentators, including the former Supreme Court judge Lord Sumption," he added.