AN OXENHOPE pub is celebrating receiving an award for being Community Pub of the Year.

The award for the Bay Horse Inn, in Hebden Bridge Road, has been confirmed by Keighley and Craven Campaign for Real Ale. (CAMRA)

For the last three and a half years the Bay Horse has been managed by husband and wife team Stephen and Ann-Mairead Pollitt.

Mrs Pollitt said she and her husband were "made up" to be told on May 2 that their pub had won the award.

Its full name is the Lynda Smith Community Pub of the Year award, as it is in memory of this dedicated Keighley and Craven CAMRA member who died in late 2015.

Mr and Mrs Pollitt moved to Oxenhope from Cheshire, and the Bay Horse is their first pub. Mrs Pollitt used to work as a purchasing manager, while her husband was a precast concrete erector.

Mrs Pollitt said the Bay Horse was chosen for the CAMRA accolade due to its selection of real ales and the central role it plays in the village community.

It hosts a pensioners' afternoon on Tuesdays, a weekly quiz night, an open mic music night on Wednesdays, another music night on Thursdays which is more oriented towards folk music and is one of the stops for the hugely popular annual Oxenhope Straw Race.

The pub fundraises for Manorlands and for the Embrace charity which helps child victims of crime, hosts a real ale and music festival each June and serves as a venue for local organisations to hold meetings.

Mrs Pollitt said she and her husband were very happy to move to Oxenhope, after seeing the pub advertised.

"It's absolutely gorgeous, we fell in love with the place as soon as we saw it," she added. "We've made some lovely friends and there's great community spirit here."

Their CAMRA award will be formally presented to them on May 23.