Alcohol licencing, new policy for Mill Road Posted:18/01/2010 23:42:31
A new licensing policy for Mill Road Over the last few years the Residents Association has been attempting to deal with the continuing problem of late night noise and vandalism. In our view one of the main causes of the problem is the provision of late night alcohol and hot food from various off licenses and take away shops in Mill Road. We believe this draws many people, many already drunk, from the center of town to our residential area.
In 2003 the government introduced a new Licensing Act which required shops opening after 11pm to obtain a license, but the downside was that the new law made it easier to late night licenses to be obtained!
New applications
The new legislation brought a large number of applications for late night opening and the Association has attended numerous hearings arguing for the rights of local residents. We have been supported in this by hundreds of well argued letters from local people. This support has been invaluable and we have been generally successful holding opening times to 12 midnight, which in our view is a reasonable compromise between the needs of business and the residential amenity of our neighbourhood.
Last year however we ran into a particularly difficult problem with the application for a 24 hour drinks license from the International Stores at 96 Mill Road. Although the 24 hour license was rejected the police supported a 1.00am license and this was granted by the Council. The barrister acting for the owner of the shop argued that there was no proof that patrons of this particular shop were responsible for criminal damage. This is a difficult point to refute since it is not practical to challenge those causing vandalism and conduct a survey to discover where they have obtained alcohol, even though we all know there is a clear link between late night drinking and criminal damage.
Cumulative Impact
There is however a little used part of the legislation called ‘Cumulative Impact Zones’. This gives the Council to right to declare that an area has sufficient licensed premises and that more shops or changes in opening times would be likely to cause additional problems. This removes the need to prove a direct link between the sort of problems we experience and any particular premise applying for a late license.
Last year the Police asked the Council to declare the City Center and the Cambridge Leisure Park Cumulative Impact Zones. To our amazement Mill Road was not included and at a subsequent Council meeting Association Chair Barbara Bell challenged the police to explain why. This prompted the police to do another statistical survey and to rethink the area to be covered.
The result was that the police finally asked for Mill Road to be declared a Cumulative Impact Zone and the City Council Licensing Panel agreed.
This is huge step forward in resisting unsuitable applications that threaten our residential amenity and we would like to thank everyone who has written letters of support.
