THE manager at an Oswaldtwistle pub says it will now stay open after grant money came through as they battled to pay bills during the pandemic.

Jordan Kelly runs the Lord Longworth on St Thomas Street with his mum Rose Kelly and partner Jade Walsh, and he issued a plea to the Lancashire Telegraph as they had tried to get business grants but had not heard anything back.

With mounting bills and demands for payments, the 32-year-old said they were struggling to see light at the end of the tunnel as they were a wet-let pub.

The dad-of-two has been applying to Hyndburn Council for a number of grants for businesses but has only received two payments, including £10,000 at the start of the pandemic and then another £905 in December.

He has contacted the council to find out about the outcome of the other grants, but hit a brick wall.

The Telegraph contacted the authority, and things are looking up for the business.

A council spokesman said: “I can confirm that this business applied for two grants and both of these grants were paid. After receiving a further enquiry from the business, we identified they had not applied for other grants which they were eligible for.

“Within 48 hours of this enquiry about further support our team at used the information the business supplied for previous grants and applied for these grants on their behalf, they were processed yesterday, and payment issued today.”

Jordan said: “All our savings have been used up and it has been hard as it is the last thing you think of going to bed at night and first thing you think in the morning.

“We are living off furlough at the minute and that is not enough to pay the pub bills.

“We are quite a close-knit community in Oswaldtwistle and I am part of a WhatsApp group among the pubs in the area so we can let each other know if there is any trouble at any other pubs and be aware of it.

“I asked them if they had got the grants, and then some on Blackburn had also been getting it.

“I had been applying for them since October and did not get any reply or anything.

“We are just grateful that the Telegraph has managed to help with this.

“It just means we can pay some of the bills like we did in March last year when we got the first grants. We can just try to get back on our feet again.

“The thing was that we could not get any other jobs as no-one is really employing people and we could not get side jobs.”