Agenda and minutes

To agree the procedure rules for remote meetings.

RESOLVED –

THAT the guidance on remote meetings be agreed.  

Apologies were received from Councillor Sabrina Francis. It was noted that the meeting was quorate with two Members present.

There were no declarations of interest.

Broadcasting of meeting

The Chair stated: “In addition to the rights by law that the public and press have to record this meeting, this meeting is being recorded and broadcast live by the Council to the Internet and can be viewed on our website for six months after the meeting. After that time, recordings are archived and can be made available upon request.

If you address the meeting, you are deemed to consent to having your contributions recorded and broadcast, including video when switched on, and to the use of those sound recordings and images for webcasting and/or training purposes.”

There were no notifications of urgent business.

Report of the Executive Director, Supporting Communities.

This is an application to review a premises licence under section 51 of the Licensing Act 2003.

Consideration was given to a report of the Executive Director, Supporting Communities detailing an application to review a premises licence under Section 51 of the Licensing Act 2003.

The Licensing Officer introduced the report and outlined the premises’ existing hours. He explained that the review was brought because the Applicants believed the licensing objective of the prevention of public nuisance was not being upheld.

The application to review the licence had been brought by Alex Liang and Rob Finean. Alex Liang introduced the application and made the following points in his submission:

·       He had been a resident of the building where the premises is located for 6 years and, over the past 2 years, had suffered nuisance from the premises.

·       He explained that he had raised this matter with PC Hallam from the Metropolitan Police and had been advised to lodge a review with the Licensing Authority. He thanked PC Hallam for his advice.

·       He had also raised the matter with the Council’s Out-Of-Hours noise team but had not been satisfied with their response.

·       He said that on one occasion, when he had gone downstairs to raise concerns with the premises, an individual in attendance indicated that he had a knife on his person which made him feel intimidated.

·       The premises were busy after their licensed hours, with noise after midnight or 1am.

·       He did not believe the Licence Holder had improved their management of the premises over the last two years, and so he was of the view that the licence should be revoked.

Members asked questions of the Applicants and key points from the discussion were:

·       The noisiest times at the premises tended to be on weekends and when events held under TENs (Temporary Event Notices) were taking place.

·       The Applicants had not seen SIA door supervisors on duty at the premises.

·       Mr Liang said he had not reported the incident where an individual had shown him a knife, as he did not believe the incident was serious enough to report as the individual had not actually pointed the knife at him – just indicated that he had one on his person.

The representative of the Environmental Health Responsible Authority asked a question of Mr Liang about noise from the premises. Mr Liang said the noise appeared to him to be reverberating up the building, rather than being emitted straight outside.

There were submissions from four Responsible Authorities – Environmental Health, the Licensing Authority, the Planning Authority and the Metropolitan Police. Key points made in their submissions were:

·       There had been 11 complaints relating to the premises between 2022 and 2023, but Environmental Health officers had not themselves witnessed nuisance they considered sufficient for them to call for revocation for the premises licence.

·       The Licensing Authority representative noted the residents’ concern about public nuisance and that the premises already had numerous conditions on its licence. If they were not being adhered to, the officer did not believe there were any further conditions  which could be added to deal  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6.

There was no other business.

Should the Panel wish to go into closed session, it will take the following resolution:

THAT the press and public be excluded from the proceedings of the Licensing Panel on 11 January 2024 during consideration of the respective item on the agenda on the grounds that it is likely, in view of the nature of the business to be transacted, that were members of the public to be present, there would be disclosure of exempt information as defined in Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972 (as amended) and that the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.

Specifically -

Publicity in respect of item x would be likely to lead to the disclosure of information in respect of which a claim to legal professional privilege could be maintained in legal proceedings by virtue of Category 5 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972 (as amended).