The landlord of The Dolphin Inn has contacted Nub News to correct the details on how just two of his customers have tested positive for coronavirus - and that he was never contacted by the tracking system.

Landlord Martin Spiller, who has run the pub since 2012, acted on his own accord, and told Nub News that he did: " The only responsible thing and shut the pub myself until I have all the evidence and all the people can get tested. My responsibility is to keep my staff and customers safe, so I shut it ."

Martin said that he first heard rumours yesterday ( August 19) at around 2.30 pm that one of his customers had tested positive for Covid-19. That customer had been in the pub at the weekend.

" So I contacted them directly. I did that as a responsible landlord, so when I heard that yes, they had tested positive, I immediately contacted the licensing authority. But I couldn't get hold of anyone because they can only be contacted by email, so then I tried to get hold of Public Health England. Again they only had a helpline and I was told it was up to me as to what steps I took about closing. Again no one contacted me from track and trace."

Martin, who has a special 'fogging' machine to clean the small popular pub, closed the doors until he could get professional medical advice and get his staff tested. He used a Radstock local company Virus Shield who offer this service to any business. Due to the links with Centurion Travel, Martin has bought his own system from them so that they can also fog the coaches after every use too.

Then today (August 20) he was called by one more person who had been in The Dolphin Inn to say that they too had also tested positive, having also visited the pub at the weekend.

" I took the responsible decision to close the pub - my decision as a responsible landlord is to protect my staff and my other customers. That is enough for me to take the decision to close to protect them. But I wasn't asked to close and no one contacted me to say anyone had tested positive with any tracing system."

At the time of writing three of the five staff at The Dolphin have tested negative and Martin himself is still waiting to hear his results.

He again wanted to stress that no medical or professional organisation had made him close the pub and shockingly he has STILL not heard anything from the tracing teams.

Martin did not want to comment on whether the customers concerned had been drinking in other Midsomer Norton pubs, declining to name the places where it was believed that they had been.

He added: " I do not want to scare people and I hate fake news. I came to a decision as landlord as to what was the responsible thing to do, what other pubs have done is not my business. At the end of the day my job is to support my staff and my customers."