BREWERS and publicans raised a pint to the Chancellor last night after he unexpectedly scrapped the beer duty escalator.

Mr Osborne announced that not just the 3p rise in beer tax planned for this year, but the schedule to automatically increase beer duty by two per cent above inflation every single year would be cancelled and then he further reduced beer duty by 1p per pint.

Paul Crossman, landlord of The Swan in Clementhorpe, York, said: “It’s really good news.

He said the price of a pint won’t come down, but the change does mean pubs won’t have to put prices up again. He said: “We always get hit by two increases at this time of year. The breweries put up their prices, caused by their increased costs, before the budget then the duty increase comes after their own increase. This year it’s lovely not to have to do that second increase.

“It’s not going to solve all the problems. There are other factors causing high prices in the pub sector and this will hopefully make them focus on those issues.”

John Lewis, founder of microbrewery Treboom, based at Shipton-by-Beningbrough, said he was surprised by the move.

“You could have knocked me down with a feather,” he said. “It’s certainly going to go some way to helping the industry, although we do have a lot of other costs that have gone up like the cost of malted barley because of the very poor summer and fuel costs.

He said it was vindication of a lot of campaigning done by organisations including the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) and the Society of Independent Brewers (SIBA) who launched an e-petition signed by more than 108,000 consumers, a mass lobby day and rallied more than 8,000 people in writing to their MPs calling for a fair deal for beer and pubs.

• The “duty escalator” will remain in place for wine, cider and spirits.