Agenda and minutes

RESOLVED:  That Councillor Adam Swersky be appointed Chair of the Licensing Panel Hearing.

RESOLVED:  To note that there were no declarations of interest made by Members.

[Note:  Licensing Panel minutes are:-

(1)          approved following each meeting by the Members serving on that particular occasion and signed as a correct record by the Chair for that meeting;

(2)          not submitted to the next panel meeting for approval.

Reasons: The Licensing Panel is constituted from a pooled membership. Consequently, a subsequent Panel meeting is likely to comprise a different Chair and Members who took no part in the previous meeting’s proceedings. The process referred to at (1) above provides appropriate approval scrutiny].

The Chair asked the Panel Members, officers, Responsible Authority and other attendees at the meeting to introduce themselves and then outlined the procedure for the conduct of an oral hearing, which was set out in the agenda.

Report of the Corporate Director, Community Directorate.

In attendance:

RESOLVED:  That having taken into account the following:

·                     Written and oral representations by all the parties

·                     The Licensing Act 2003

·                     The Guidance issued under section 182 of the Licensing Act 2003

·                     Harrow Council’s Licensing Policy

·                     Human Rights Act 1998

·                     The considerations in s.17 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998

The Premises Licence be revoked.

REASONS:

Whilst the Panel noted the attempts between the Applicant and Licensee to agree conditions prior to the meeting commencing, the Panel unanimously concluded that the only correct decision in the circumstances was to revoke the Premises Licence.

Although this was the first time that the Licence had been before the Panel for review, the Panel noted that this was the Licensee’s second offence involving contraband goods at the licensed premises.  The Licensee had pleaded guilty to various offences concerning contraband tobacco in November 2015, following a joint search of the Licensed Premises by Trading Standards and HMRC in April 2015.  As a result of that search HMRC also seized a significant quantity of contraband alcohol.

While the Panel had felt that it might have been arguable that the Licensee’s first offence was a mistake, the Panel felt that the Licensee’s behaviour had not changed as a result of the criminal conviction and the Licensee had, within a matter of months of conviction, committed exactly the same offences again.  The Panel were extremely concerned that at the  time of the second joint search of the Licensed Premises by Trading Standard and HMRC in February 2016, a far greater amount of contraband alcohol had been found than at the first search.  The Panel concluded that the Licensee’s offending had worsened, despite the criminal prosecution.  The Panel placed a great deal of weight on the Licensee’s repeat offending and the escalation of that offending.

The Panel heard from the Licensee’s representative the Licensee had invoices for all the alcohol seized at the time of the second search and that it had been legitimately purchased.  However, there had been a delay in producing these invoices because they had been sent to India for scanning by the Licensee’s accountant.  The Panel also heard from Trading Standards that their investigation remained opened and the Licensee had still not produced invoices to Trading Standard or, as far as they were aware, to HMRC either.  The invoices were not produced to the Panel.  The Panel were satisfied that duty had not been paid on the alcohol as alleged by Trading Standards.

The Panel carefully considered the proposed conditions to be added to the Licence.  The Panel did not think that proposed conditions 1-11 properly addressed the reason why a review of the Licence had been brought in the first place.  The Panel noted the proposed conditions were either in the licence or updated conditions already  ...  view the full minutes text for item 103.