Agenda and draft minutes

The Licensing Panel considered the appointment of a Chairman for the meeting.

Resolved:

That Councillor Hutton be appointed Chairman for the meeting.

Members are asked to declare any interests in the items under consideration and in doing so state:-

(1) the type of interest concerned

(2) the nature of the interest concerned; and

(3) whether they have or have not sat on a Planning Committee which has previously considered a planning application in respect of a licensed premises which is also subject to consideration for a premises licence as part of the agenda for this meeting.

If any Member requires advice on declarations of interests, they are advised to contact the Head of Democratic Governance in advance of the meeting.

There were no declarations of interest on this occasion.

The Chairman of the Panel will summarise the procedure and announce the equal maximum amount of time for each party to speak for the hearing.

A.         Items 1 and 4 (b) will be undertaken in private session by the Panel and not in the Meeting Room.

B.         Items 2, 3 and 4(a) will be recommended to the Panel to be held in public.

C.         The Panel may decide to exclude the public from all or part of a hearing where it considers that the public interest in so doing outweighs the public interest in the hearing, or that part of the hearing, taking place in public. (This includes a party and any person assisting or representing a party)

The Chairman explained the procedure for the meeting, including the order in which the application and representations would be heard and that each party would be allocated 15 minutes to present their case.

To consider a Temporary Event Notice for Flame Inn, 4 Queen Street, Blackpool, FY1 1PD.

A. Application and representations submitted. To consider the attached report.

B. Determination of the application for a new Premises Licence – Flame Inn.

The Licensing Panel will indicate how the decision is to be communicated to interested parties.

The Licensing Panel considered a Temporary Event Notice for Flame Inn, 4 Queen Street, Blackpool, FY1 1PD, to provide Late Night Refreshment to 04.00 on the evenings of 27 and 28 May and to 03.00 on 29 May 2022.

The applicant, Lasma Rozite, appeared before the Panel and explained that the Temporary Event Notice had been applied for to demonstrate that the venue would be operated responsibly as a late night takeaway before an application was made to vary the existing licence to extend the hours permanently. The premises had previously traded as a restaurant but changes had recently been made to the Premises Licence to remove the permission to supply alcohol and provide entertainment and the intention going forwards was that it would operate predominantly as a late night takeaway with a limited amount of seating.

The Panel was advised that Ms Rozite had experience in running an existing town centre restaurant and had held a Personal Alcohol licence since 2015. Whilst there was no intention to sell alcohol at Flame Inn, Ms Rozite believed her experience in alcohol licensed premises had equipped her with the ability to understand and deal with difficult or intoxicated customers should she encounter them late into the evening. In her opinion, allowing the provision of late night refreshment at an additional premises on Queen Street would not place any extra burden on Policing the area and would instead assist in dispersing patrons into smaller groups by having an additional venue.

PC Andrew Taylor presented the objections on behalf of Blackpool Police Licensing Unit. Members were informed that the venue fell within Claremont ward which had the highest number of alcohol related Police incidents in Lancashire with 81 Police logs and 33 recorded crimes on Queen Street in the last month. In the Police’s opinion, the applicant had insufficient experience in operating late night takeaways and the granting of the Notice would only add to the existing issues relating to the licensing objectives of Crime and Disorder and Public Safety. He suggested that the premises should initially operate to its current terminal hour of 01.00 to test the impact on the area before applying to extend the hours to 04.00.

Answering questions in relation to the conditions on the existing Premises Licence and the requirement to provide door staff, Ms Rozite confirmed that the Licence had retained the door staff condition when the premises was repurposed from a restaurant selling alcohol. PC Taylor informed the Panel that the condition only required door staff to be employed based on a risk assessment by the licence holder and therefore expressed concern that there was no obligation to provide a fixed number of door staff.

The Panel considered the information provided by both parties, noting that as Temporary Event Notices were a “light touch” system it could not add any conditions to the Notice that were not already endorsed on the Premises Licence. It noted the Police’s evidence that the premises was in an area which already  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.