Mardons Social Club up in Westfield is keen to get re-opened not least because, thanks to the local MP, a leak in the ceiling of the club is going to be fixed.

The highly popular venue, which champions live music from around the south west, has had ongoing structural issues even before it opened.

Now, thanks, the club believes to the intervention and visit from the local MP Jacob Rees Mogg, builders will be coming in to fix the problem.

Mardons is then hoping to re-open, perhaps in July, following a big deep clean of all the rooms, and regular rotation of the stock to keep it safe.

The full statement from the committee is: "We hope this finds all our staff members and friends safe and well.

A quick summary of what has been happening since lockdown and looking forward to welcoming everyone back as and when we are allowed to reopen.

Many of you will know that even prior to opening and ever since we have had problems with leaks in our main ceiling. Despite many emails to the builders and various visits including from the new CEO of Banes nothing was done.

On contacting Jacob Rees-Mogg he paid us a visit (one of several over the years) and he was determined to get it resolved. Not long afterwards the builders got in touch and once lockdown is over, they have promised to resolve the situation.

Regarding lockdown we were probably the first to close in the area before the general shutdown was announced in order to safeguard our staff and customers. We also informed our staff that we would pay them in full for as long as we could to reward their loyalty and thank them for their efforts. This was before the furlough scheme and grants were announced. The furlough scheme itself has obviously helped us and we are in good financial shape looking forward. In fact we had recently completed a bar refurbishment and toilets upgrade costing several thousand pounds so we are well set for opening when it happens.

We had prepared in advance the paperwork necessary to apply for the various schemes announced by Government to assist the Hospitality sector such that as soon as the help was made available it came through very quickly without a hitch.

During lockdown we have been ensuring our stock remains sequenced 'in date' and working with the brewery we are following their guidelines on regular maintenance we are ensuring our cellar and beer lines stay safe and clean ready to serve our beers, lagers and ciders to the high quality our customers have become used to.

The club as a whole has been given a deep clean and we are awaiting the guidelines from the Government's Hospitality Task Force in order to produce a Risk Assessment, Notices, instructions etc for Management, Staff and Customers to follow in order to satisfy the requirements.

Hopefully we are nearer the end than the beginning and look forward to the announcement that we can open our doors (July??) once again."