Licensed Trade Charity

The Licensed Trade Charity cares for people working in, or retired from, the licensed drink trade and their dependents.
It was founded by Royal Charter on 3 May 1836 as the Society of Licensed Victuallers and adopted the working name Licensed Trade Charity in October 2004 following a merger with the Licensed Victuallers National Homes charity.

Today the Charity has two main aims: Support and Care, and Education, and its objectives are to:

Assist those who are sick, infirm or distressed

Provide assistance in the case of financial hardship

Provide assistance with the relief of the ills of old age

Educate children from the general public, with preference to those from families working in the licensed drinks trade, through guaranteed places, discounts and bursaries.

The Charity runs three independent schools. LVS Ascot is a day and boarding school for girls and boys aged 4 to 18 years providing education for 900 pupils. LVS Hassocks a specialist school offering day and residential education for girls and boys aged 8 to 19 with learning difficulties such as autism and Asperger's syndrome. The school opened in 2009. LVS Oxford which opened in 2014 and provides education and weekly residential places for children 11-19 years old who have a diagnosis on the Autism spectrum.

See website for further details www.licensedtradecharity.org.uk

The Society of Licensed Victuallers was founded in 1793 as a friendly society for the mutual benefit of publicans and the relief of members of the licensed victualing trade and their families. It was formed by men who could afford to pay an annual subscription of one guinea and the idea was to create a fund from which a weekly allowance could be paid to those on hard times. A daily newspaper the Morning Advertiser was established in 1794 to promote the Society's interests and raise funds. It was devoted to trade interests and still exists claiming the title of the oldest continually produced paper in the United Kingdom.

In 1803 the Licensed Victuallers School was established in Kennington. The school was built by the society to educate and look after the children of licensees. Although the school was initially small, numbers increased and the original school was demolished in 1835 and a new larger one built on the same site. In 1921 the school moved to new premises in Slough, Berkshire and then to Ascot in 1980.

An additional school in Ilkley was acquired by the SLV in 1982 and closed in 2005.

In 1997 the SLV merged with the Licensed Trade Convalescent Homes (LTCH). The LTCH was founded in 1962 to provide a place where licensees and their wives could go to recuperate after illness. In 1965 a hotel was purchased in Margate, Kent (Croft House) shortly followed by another in Lytham St Anne's and a third in Exmouth. Over the years continuous investment saw the acquisition of the Grafton Hotel near Hereford and its development into a more modern rest home providing care and relaxation.

The Licensed Victuallers National Homes (LVNH) started life as the Licensed Victuallers Asylum became Licensed Victuallers Benevolent Institution in 1921 and the Licensed Victuallers National Homes in 1959.

The Licensed Victuallers' Asylum (LVA) was formed in 1826 to relieve poor and aged members of the licensed victualing trade and their wives or widows. Alms houses were built in Caroline Gardens (still there today) including a central chapel. The Alms houses were sold to Southwark Council in 1960 when the Licensed Victuallers Benevolent Institution decided to move the residents to new premises in Denham Garden Village, Buckinghamshire. The dwellings in Peckham are still used, although the chapel is listed on English Heritage's national register of buildings at risk.

Denham Garden Village was built in the 1950s by the Licensed Victuallers National Homes (LVNH) to provide accommodation for retired licensees and became part of about 30 estates UK wide owned by LVNH. Licensees could pay a yearly subscription that would enable them to be considered for a place in one of its estates and to receive a basic pension. Denham was innovative for the time. Residents lived in new bungalows with shared communal gardens. The 'village' had all amenities on site including a, shop, pub, social club as well as a nursing home, medical care and a welfare officer.

In the late 1990's LVNH transferred its homes to Anchor Housing Trust to enable the management and upgrading of the properties to be done to comply with changes in housing law.