TIME has been called on a Cirencester pub after permission was granted to convert it into a home.

Hook Norton Brewery put the Oddfellows Arms up for sale earlier this year after successive managers failed to make it a commercial success.

At a Cotswold District Council planning meeting today, councillors voted to allow new owner Andrew Jacques to convert the Chester Street into a residential home, despite strong opposition from pub regulars.

Local Russell Blackaller called on the councillors to block the move, saying the pub could be a viable business under the right owners.

He added that for locals “there are no alternative pubs with a sunny beer garden, where families can relax”.

He went on: “It’d make a lovely house for one family, but it should continue to be a lovely public house for hundreds of families.

“Times are tough for pubs but if they’ve got good beer, good food and something special, people will use them.

“Why lose another pub when our population is about to explode?”

Planning officers recommended councillors allow the pub to be changed into a house because there were nine other pubs within 500metres.

There are now 20 pubs left in Cirencester.

District councillor Juliet Layton said it was a “terrible shame” the council was considering losing the pub and fellow Lib Dem Patrick Coleman said Cirencester would suffer from a lack of diversity in its pubs if the Oddfellows closed for good.

He added: “There’s no evidence that the pub can’t work, but there’s lots of evidence that once it’s gone, it's gone - it will be lost for good.”

But Sue Coakley said people’s “patterns of behaviour” had changed.

“A lot of work has been done to keep this open and it has failed," she said.

“Sometimes we have to accept that things can’t stay the same as they were.”

Forty people wrote letters to the council protesting the change and 25 wrote letters of support.

Hook Norton Brewery bought the Oddfellows in 2007 and sold it in May this year.