A GOOD pub landlady is many things. She is a confidante, a counsellor and a comedienne. She is both friend and law enforcer. She is a businesswoman and an ambassador - not to mention cook, waitress and chief bottle washer. Find any lively, popular and trouble-free public house and you will inevitably find a respected landlady behind the bar.

Susan Warren was one of this breed. For 15 years she performed the multiple role of landlady, running the Boot & Shoe in Tockwith alongside her husband Patrick. They were a partnership, both in marriage and in business. An equal partnership, as their job title - joint managers - made clear.

That contract was so binding that when Mr Warren took early retirement on health grounds, pub owners Samuel Smith insisted his wife left too.

Yet, according to a ground-breaking legal claim by her solicitors, Langleys, up until that point Mrs Warren had never been treated as an equal partner by the brewery. She was only allocated one fifth of the amount earned by her husband - which worked out at less than the minimum wage. Neither did she enjoy the benefits, including access to a pension scheme, that he did.

Mrs Warren is taking Samuel Smith to an industrial tribunal seeking equal pay and compensation. Countless other women in the licensed trade will be watching the case with great interest. They also stand to benefit from a successful outcome, the lawyers believe.

That would suggest that archaic pay structures and working conditions are widespread in the industry.

It seems that the age of equality has so far passed by pub landladies. But women workers can fight back, as the recent court victory by North Yorkshire dinner ladies demonstrated.

If pub landladies do secure a better deal, one that recognises they have a worth independent of their husband, every fair-minded pub-goer in the land will toast their success.