An influential committee of MPs has called for legislation to regulate big pub companies – including Midland firms Punch Taverns and Enterprise Inns – to stop locals closing at an “alarming” rate.

In a strongly-worded report that referred to “bullying and intimidation” of lessees across the industry, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills’ (BIS) committee concluded that self-regulation had “failed” to deliver meaningful reform.

The committee, chaired by West Bromwich West MP Adrian Bailey, called for an “adjudicator armed with a full suite of sanctions” to police the behaviour of pub companies.

A major issue is the “beer tie” – where the landlords have to buy most of their beer from the company from which the premises are leased – following little progress.

The committee said this and other failings were contributing to pubs’ closing at an “alarming rate” – as new research carried out by CR Consulting showed one in five publicans has considered selling up or closing down their business within the last six months.

The group of MPs criticised progress made by the British Beer & Pub Association (BBPA) – whose members account for nearly two-thirds of Britain’s 52,500 pubs – to implement reform, calling it “impotent”.

However, the BBPA – which counts Burton-based Punch and Solihull-based Enterprise among its members – said it had made “significant progress” and it was it was “deeply disappointed” by the report.

And an Enterprise spokesperson told the Birmingham Post that its code of practice addresses much of the report.

Mr Bailey said: “The deep-seated problems within the pub industry, and in particular the relationship between pub companies and their lessees who run pubs, have been the subject of repeated scrutiny by Parliamentary select committees.

‘‘Our report is the fourth report on those problems over the past seven years.

“Each report challenged the industry to deliver meaningful reform.

‘‘On every occasion the industry was found wanting. The third report in 2010 delivered a final ultimatum to the industry: 18 months to show that they were working successfully within the voluntary code.

‘‘That has passed and the evidence is that they are not. The message now can only be ‘three strikes and you’re out’.”

Mr Bailey said the MPs saw no other alternative than statutory regulation, accusing the pub industry of failing to put its house in order.

“Pubs are businesses and they need to be able to succeed as businesses, but they are also at the heart of our communities and we are losing them at an alarming rate,” he added.

Mr Bailey said the Government should now set out a timetable for statutory regulation and begin the process “as a matter of urgency.”