Agenda and minutes

Licensing Sub-Committee - Monday, 22nd October, 2012 7.00 pm

Venue: Council Chamber Town Hall. View directions

Contact: Ivor Westmore 

Items
No. Item

10.

Chair's Welcome

The Chair will open the meeting and welcome all present.

Minutes:

The Chair opened the Hearing and introduced the Members of the Sub-Committee and officers present.  The Chair explained to all parties the procedure to be followed during the Hearing.

 

11.

Apologies

To receive apologies for absence and the details of any Councillor nominated to attend the meeting in place of a member listed above.

Minutes:

There were no apologies for absence.

 

12.

Declarations of interest

To invite Councillors to declare any interest they may have in the item on the agenda.

Minutes:

There were no declarations of interest from Members of the Sub-Committee.

 

The meeting was informed that Councillors Greg Chance and Debbie Taylor had been granted a dispensation by the Council’s Standards Committee to attend the present meeting but that the extent of their involvement would be to present representations on behalf of local residents who had asked them to speak on their behalf. It was disclosed that Councillor Pat Witherspoon had also been granted a dispensation by the Standards Committee as she had submitted written representations on the application and this would allow her the same rights to address the Sub-Committee as were enjoyed by others who had made representations in a similar manner. It was made clear that, once her representations had been made, Councillor Witherspoon should leave the meeting.

 

13.

Application for variation of a Premises Licence - The Queen's Head, Bromsgrove Road, Redditch, B97 4RL pdf icon PDF 68 KB

To consider an application for the variation of a premises licence for the Queen’s Head, Bromsgrove Road, Redditch, B97 4RL.

 

(Report attached)

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Sub-Committee was asked to consider an application for the variation of the premises licence in respect of The Queen’s Head, Bromsgrove Road, Redditch, Worcestershire, B97 4RL.  The application was subject to a Hearing in the light of a number of representations which had been made by local residents.  The basis of their representations related primarily to public nuisance. 

 

The Technical Officer, Licensing introduced the report and in doing so informed the Sub-Committee of an error, in that the Designated Premises Supervisor was identified as a Mr Mark Farmer whereas it should have identified the individual as a Mr Michael Lanfear. Otherwise there was no further update to provide with regard to the application. The advertisement of the application was the subject of considerable discussion. Local residents were unhappy that the notice had been displayed in such a way as made it difficult to read and it was noted that the Licensing Team had been alerted to the fact and had subsequently visited the premises to assess the siting of the notice. The Technical Officer confirmed that his colleague who had visited the premises was satisfied that the notice was visible and added that the relevant legislation did not specify in any great detail how such notices should be displayed. It was suggested by one of the parties to the hearing that the Council adopt a policy of its own specifying the requirements on premises displaying such notices to ensure that they were suitably visible. Further to this discussion, it was also stated that the notice had been displayed for an additional week in response to concerns from the Technical Officer that insufficient detail was provided on alterations to conditions on the existing licence.

 

Mr Terry Poultney, agent for the applicant, presented the case in support of his client’s application. Mr Poultney circulated several photographs of the premises with the agreement of the Sub-Committee. Reverting to the subject of the notice, it was stated that the placement had been dictated by the obscured nature of many of the ground floor windows and had been acceptable to the Licensing Authority. Likewise, Mr Poultney added that the level of detail provided in the original notice had been adequate to comply with the relevant legislation but that the additional information had been provided upon the request from the Technical Officer.

 

Mr Poultney informed the meeting that the applicants had met with the Licensing Authority and PC Paul Bott prior to submitting the application. Mr Poultney contended that the existing licence was deficient in a number of respects. It was suggested that the existing conditions on the sale of alcohol were more appropriate to a nightclub and that the Police had proposed that the premises did not need to be a part of the Pubwatch scheme. The installation of suitable CCTV was a part of the proposal within the application. It was noted that no responsible authorities had made representations on the application.

 

Mr Poultney stated that the applicant did not disagree with  ...  view the full minutes text for item 13.