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Licensing Sub-Committee
Thursday, 29th October 2026 at 7:00pm

 
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Thank you, Chair. The meeting is now live. Fantastic. Thank you, Mr. Flowers. Well, welcome
to this meeting of the Licencing Subcommittee, which is being held as a remote meeting. This
meeting is being webcast, so please bear with us if there are any technical issues. My name's
Councillor Mitten. I'm Chair of the meeting. I will now invite the other attendees to introduce
themselves in the following order. So if councillors then officers then the applicants and then
representations. So Councillor Lewis, did you want to go first?
I'd love to go first. My name is Councillor Sam Lewis and I represent Fersdown Ward and
I'm very happy to be here. Fantastic. Councillor Ahmad.
Hello everyone, my name is Shakil Ahmed, I'm representing West Partney Ward.
Fantastic, thank you. If I hand over to the officers next.
I'm Julie Hupp -Hindel, I'm a Licencing Officer.
Guy Bishop, Legal Advisor.
I'm Mariana Ritchie, Democratic Services Officer.
Michael Flowers, I'm the webcaster for the meeting.
And then hand over to the applicants. Hello, I'm Sarah Louise Taylor. I'm the solicitor
on behalf of the applicants and I'm joined by Alfie Downing and Liam Head, who will be
the operators.
And then hand over to the representations.
I can go first. Hi everyone, I'm Georgie. I'm one of the residents along Harbert Road.
Hi I'm Morag MacPherson. I'm also a resident of Harbert Road.
Fantastic. Just checking we don't have anybody else I don't think.
It's probably worth mentioning that there's a few other residents that we're hoping to
attend but can't because of like shifts and things so we're representing them and we've
all kind of chatted about this beforehand.
Fantastic. Thank you. And I think quite a few have submitted their representations as
well as part of the papers which we as a committee have also seen.
So thank you very much.
So Agenda Item 1 and 2, are there any apologies for absence or
declarations of interest for any items on the agenda?
No, I'll take that silence as a no.
Okay, so we'll move to Agenda Item 3, where we will now consider the
application for new premises licence in respect of the premises known as Spruce, ground floor
140 St. John's Hill, SW11 1SL, and I now invite the Licencing Officer to introduce the application.
Thank you, Councillor. Spruce Cafe Group Limited have applied for a new premises licence at
140 St. John's Hill, London SW11 1SL for the sale of alcohol for consumption on and off
premises, regulated entertainment being live and recorded music and late night refreshment.
Appendix C of the report provides the full timings for the activities being applied for.
The application was advertised as required under the legislation with a site notice of the premises
and with a newspaper advert. This resulted in the receipt of a representation from the police
licencing team and 10 representations from other persons objecting to the application.
On the 27th of October, 2026, the council received confirmation that the police representation
had been withdrawn following the applicant's agreement to the police's proposed conditions.
Consequently, the conditions set out in Appendix B on pages 8 and 9 of the committee report
now form part of Appendix A of the applicant's operating schedule to become conditions of
the licence should the application be granted. Appendix A to the report lays out the conditions
arising from the applicant's operating schedule,
which will become conditions of the licence if it is granted.
Appendix B to the report lays out suggested conditions arising from relevant
representations. Councillors,
the options that are open to you tonight when deciding this application include
granting the application as requested or modifying the conditions of the licence
to alter or omit conditions or add new or reject the whole
or part of the application.
Councillors, I've laid out the brief facts of the application, but I'll be happy to answer
any questions you may have.
Thank you.
Fantastic.
Thank you.
Are there any questions from Councillors to the licencing officer?
No.
Okay.
In that case, I'm sorry, Councillor Ahmad, did you have a question or not?
I got a question. You know the timings of the opening and closing of that. What is the current timing of that?
It's a new application so they haven't got a licence at present so unless these, and
Sarah is there anything, I don't know what time they currently close?
Generally at the moment 11, I can cover the history in my submissions if that's okay and
the reasons why we've applied for what we've applied for.
Councillor Armid, I can probably cover that in my submissions for you.
I'm assuming it's the premises, the old premises licence that he's referring to.
That's exactly it. Yeah. Thanks Guy.
And may I say something, please?
I'm a neighbourhood watch coordinator for Harbert Road and...
There will be, sorry, Ms.
McPherson, you'll have an opportunity to address the committee.
We've just run through in the order that we have,
but I will make sure that you have every opportunity.
to speak. In that case, if there are no more questions for the licencing officer, I'll now invite
Ms Louise Taylor to address the subcommittee. You'll have about 10 minutes to speak,
which we as a committee can then ask questions. And what I will say is I'll make sure that both
the applicant and the representations have equal amount of time. So, over to you.
Thank you very much chair. So this is an application as you've heard from Julie for a new premises
licence just to give some context to the history here and this has been put into correspondence
with residents. Can I just cheque at the outset an email was sent to the residents earlier
this week just outlining the background to the application some conditions that we'd
put forward. Can I just cheque if members have seen those before?
Yes we have.
You have?
It was yesterday, right?
Brilliant. Yeah, brilliant. That makes things much swifter and much, much easier for me as I make the submissions.
And so essentially here, the history is that the premises was licenced historically as a premises called Tapper Jack's, which was a tapas restaurant.
And the restaurant operated for a period of time. My clients then took the site and unfortunately instructed their property lawyers to make a transfer of the premises licence.
That didn't happen for one reason or another.
And when this came to light, immediately they got in touch with me and a new application was submitted.
But essentially what we've sought to do is to replicate both the hours and the activities and the conditions crucially
that were on that previously granted licence.
Now I know that this was for a different operator, but it's relevant context for what I'm going to say to you next.
And Councillor Ahmed, I'm hoping that that just outlines what was there before.
So essentially we're applying for a replica of what was there before.
With that said, obviously it's a new application.
Liam and Alfie are new operators.
So this is a joint venture between the two of them.
The concept is essentially a cafe which opens from sort of 7, 7 .30 in the morning
as a cafe, breakfast, coffee place, and it evolves throughout the day.
They do serve food and later on in the afternoon and the evening,
it becomes a wine bar. Just at the outset to say as well, the absolute maximum capacity of the
premises is 80, so we're not looking at a big cavernous space here, we're looking at a relatively
limited capacity. And again, as I say on the terms of what was granted there before. With that said,
when the application went in, we got a representation from the police and thankfully
we've been able to agree conditions. We did have some comments from Environmental Health, I think
there'd been a bit of confusion about whether they'd put a
representation in. I think it turns out that they actually
hadn't. But nonetheless, you'll see in the correspondence that
I'd sent over to the residents that there were a number of
conditions that Environmental Health had asked for, and where
we can we've accommodated those. There's a couple of slight
tweaks in terms of the time that the external area will be
cleared. EH had initially asked for 10 or suggested 10. And I
know that some of the residential representations also
suggest that. But just looking through the licencing policy, which I'll come to at the end, I think 11 is generally accepted. What we've done is a hybrid of the two. So between Sunday to Thursday, we've said that everybody will be in and not using the external area after 10 o 'clock. And then on the weekends, we've said 11 o 'clock.
With all of that said, Chair, and an absence of responsible authorities, I'm mindful of the fact that you would generally take your steer from the responsible authorities as to what's acceptable and what needs to be done in terms of conditions to promote the licencing objectives.
That's in paragraph 9 .12 of the guidance.
With that said, we've obviously got 10 residential representations,
so it wouldn't have been the right thing to do to just discount those and say,
well, we're only applying for what was there before and the authorities are seemingly happy with this.
So what we've done over and above that, Chair, is we've taken time,
both my clients and I have sat down and we've gone through each of the representations that have been received from local residents.
it's quite clear that there are concerns. I'm not aware that there's any substantiated complaints.
I did ask George in Environmental Health to confirm and I've not seen anything. But still,
on the basis of what was in the representations, we thought it appropriate to go through and offer
an additional, I think it's six conditions which you'll see in that correspondence. So these are
things like the timings for the outside area and this particular sensitivity I think around
delivery and refuse collection times as well.
So we've put conditions in there just to deal with those also.
Now, in terms of the external area and dispersal,
I know that there's a lot of concern and I know that we're in a sort of strange
situation here because we've got a very sort of commercial street and quite a
busy street in terms of transport and potential noise.
But we've also got residents in quite close proximity.
So what we've offered chair is a number of conditions just regarding certain
policies that we'd put into place such as an external area management plan and also a dispersal policy.
There were concerns raised about music outside and just music noise in general.
What we therefore suggested is absolutely no speakers outside just to ensure that that's not a problem.
And then just in terms of environmental health's suggestion about a noise limiter, it's quite an onerous condition for a
premises of this size and of this type as well, it's not a music venue, to instal a
noise limiter. So what we've suggested is just a slight amendment to say that if the
council's environmental health team do receive substantiated complaints, then at that point,
we would be obliged to look at installing a noise limiter and with the various conditions
about how that will be set. Just to address you, Chair, on the policy, the council's licencing
policy. At paragraph 9 .5 there are effectively, if you will, framework hours. The application that
we've made and the suggestions about the times that the external area will not be in use anymore
are well within that policy. Now we appreciate that we're in the hands of the committee
in terms of the hours and I know that the residents are going to have some suggestions in
terms of the hours, but what I would say in terms of those is although it's an all -day operation,
there's got to be a certain amount of trade period to make it a viable business over the longer term.
And that's the reason why we'd sought to replicate what was there before.
Now at the moment, generally the premises closes at 11pm.
There may be the odd occasion, but at the moment we don't know how often that might be,
when they may want to trade later.
Now obviously we've got the facility for temporary event notices, but there is a cost to those
and there's also an application process that would have to be followed if they wanted to extend hours.
So I know that there's some concerns over the application to midnight and then with the midnight 30 close.
The general consensus is that we'll be closed by 11, but we would like the flexibility in line with the premises that was there before
to be able to take advantage of additional hours. It will not be 365 days a year.
Alfie and Liam, do you just want to talk about sort of viability of the business and why we've applied for those hours beyond 11?
Yeah, no problem. I think it's pretty common knowledge these days that hospitality is a tough industry.
it's probably tough enough as it is.
So the reason for applying for hours past 11
was simply because there may be a scenario
where we might have to host some sort of private event,
but it doesn't, the nature of the business wouldn't change.
It wouldn't suddenly be an event
that hadn't been seen before at Spruce.
It's more one of those things that if we were asked
and maybe for example, on a private hire
to extend the hours to midnight,
then we were just able to do that.
And yeah, that's pretty much it.
I mean, our evening trade substantially upholsters
our business and I think it probably does this more
than we realised it would do before we opened our doors.
So yeah, to almost lose out on that,
which I don't wanna jump to conclusions,
but would be somewhat detrimental to the business
and Alfie and I are two 26 year old guys
that are just at the end of the day,
like chancing their arm,
you know, starting a successful business and that's about it. Yeah. Okay, fabulous. Thanks, Liam.
And Chair, just to draw your attention in the guidance now, we've got a new section 1 .18
that takes account of the need to promote economic growth. That's there and you've heard of the
need to do that and to have the additional hours. But that's not to say we discount what the
residents have said. I hope you'll take some comfort from the fact that we've offered for
for a premises of this size and also for the hours that we're applying for,
quite a significant amount of additional conditions that hopefully give some
reassurance both to the committee, but also to the residents as well,
that Alfie and Liam are taking this seriously and it's not their intention at
all to come in and to cause a problem. In fact,
they want to be part of the community. Over and above that as well, Chair,
there was an existing condition about a telephone number for residents.
We've updated that just to say that there'll be a dedicated direct mobile number with the number to be distributed to the residents.
That way, if there is a problem, ultimately we need to know about it and it would give them that direct contact.
It's then down to Alfie and Liam to respond to that as well.
And I think that concludes my submissions, Chair. Thank you.
Fantastic. Thank you very much.
I'll now open up to the committee for any questions
to the applicant.
Councillor Lewis, do you have any questions?
Councillor Ahmad, did you have any?
Yes, I have many questions,
but the thing is like when I read out the representation
from the residents,
So, there are quite a lot of things which people want to be the way it's done.
The first thing is like the pavements.
A lot of people, if you see the pictures, they're always there as people drinking outside
on the pavement and there is smashed bottles, there's letters across the old road on the pavement
and the noise disturbance and how can they like, you know the music,
How can they ensure that the doors and windows will be closed at all the time?
So people could be disturbed around the noise and all the people going inside and outside.
So how can they monitor it or how can they enforce those things?
Okay, thank you, Councillor Ahmed. I can answer that. We've offered quite a number of additional
conditions, having gone through the representations, I'd sat with my clients and we'd gone through
sort of one by one, all of the representations and the different elements of the representations,
where the concerns were. So you've got to Appendix A of your agenda pack, the conditions
that were on the previous licence, which the council had granted and deemed that to be appropriate.
We've also got the police conditions that we've offered as well, which is a risk assessment for any door staff,
for example, if there was an event where they might be required. Bummerability and wave training, for example.
What we've also put forward, Councillor Ahmed, is a number of conditions that relate to noise,
and these came after suggestions from environmental health.
So we've got things like no amplified, no music or amplified sound shall be generated within the premises that gives rise to a nuisance within nearby residential dwellings.
We've also got conditions about the times that the external areas will be cleared.
We've got all sales of alcove consumption off the premises, a side of those being consumed in that external area will only be in sealed containers.
We've got a condition, Councillor Almeida, hopefully this will be the key for you on this one.
The premises shall implement an external area management plan which must also deal with the management of smokers.
The plan shall be made available to officers of responsible authorities on request.
We've also added a condition, external doors and windows shall be kept closed, safer entry and egress when recorded or live music is being played.
There's another condition on there about plant ventilation and extraction equipment being correctly installed, operated and maintained to make sure that it doesn't cause an issue.
And then also a further condition, external areas will be regularly monitored and patrolled to prevent customers from congregating outside the premises causing noise or nuisance to nearby residents as well.
So they were some additional conditions. And then in addition to those, Councillor Ahmed, we've offered conditions around waste disposal and glass collection, because that's one of the things that was brought up in the representations.
We've also offered no speakers or amplified music outside. Also a dispersal policy as well.
So hopefully that gives you some reassurance that those are conditions that would sit on the licence if the committee are minded to grant this and to breach them as a criminal offence.
Councillor Armond, does that answer your question?
Yeah, but do you plan to get some CCTV cameras around the premises if these conditions are
broken, so then the concept can take some actions against the business?
Because often we see things which is fine, you can write down what you want, but when
When it comes to the practical things, when it comes on the practical basis, then there
is a lot of violations.
It's broken glasses everywhere, pavements are like you can't walk even, and late night.
How can you, like, the sound is gone so far at night.
You can't control it 100%.
But when people are entering in the bar,
or in the business, coming in and out,
so that music, if it is loud,
it's like people are uncomfortable with it.
When they see, especially that area is a lot of residents,
It's residential area. It's in the residential area and a quite easy road. Is there any conditions
which we can, I can give like a suggestion, so there should be an evidence or a condition to put
that if there is a CTV camera in the business and that will be available to the council if the
people or the residents come and let the council know that these conditions are breached so
then the council can take action against the business.
Yes, Councillor Ahmed, if you look at Appendix A of the committee agenda pack, so it's page
7 I believe, you'll see that there's a section on CCTV. This was on the original application
so we've got a closed circuit television CCTV system shall be installed at the premises,
a condition that that's to be maintained in effective working order and operational at all
times the premises are open to the public. All recordings to be made, all recordings,
sorry, made by CCTV shall be retained and stored in a suitable and secure manner for a minimum of
31 days and be made available on request to the Met Police Licencing Authority or other responsible
authorities. And then just to finalise that condition,
Councillor Ahmed, there's a section that states that at all
times the premises are open to the public, a minimum of one
member of staff on duty shall be able to operate the CCTV system.
And so there will be a CCTV system in there. Just in
relation to music and generally to noise, this is not the kind
of premises that will be sort of loud music, vibrant, vertical
drinking bar in the evening. It's very much sort of an all day into evening concept, but it will
generally be background music that they would have in there. It's not a cocktail bar type vibe in
there at all. We have also offered that condition that if there were to be any complaints about
music noise that were substantiated by the council, then the premises would instal a noise limiter.
But I don't envision with the operations it is at the moment that that would be necessary.
It's very much not a music venue.
And is this premises will be used for private hire, so the people can hire it, and the conditions
from opening and closing time.
So I think the best is to like half 10 or late 11.
I think that should be the best thing.
Sorry, Councillor Ahmad.
So the questions here just to get clarification on aspects of the application.
So if you do have any questions on any parts of it that you just want clarity from the
applicant, then please do ask away.
If not, I do have one or two questions of clarity.
I'm happy to happy to pose to that.
And so I think the first the first one was just I know you in the applicant application,
sorry, you've put in one of the conditions that there would be the dispersal policy for
people when they're leaving the leaving the venue.
it'd just be good just to get a bit of an understanding and some clarity on
some of those measures that would happen, say at closing time, people vacating and then
obviously going, I note that there was going to be some liaison with taxi companies to support
people to leave the premises, but it'd just be good to understand a bit more about that.
Yeah, that's probably Alfie and Liam, that's probably a question for you. So do you want
to explain the sort of wind down period now and what happens?
Yeah, sure thing. So like we say, we shut at 11. Last orders are at 10 .30. And then from
there we let you say people need to start finishing up. If anyone's got stuff that they
need to drink or they've got anything left over, we'll give them a plastic cup, worst
case scenario, but that doesn't happen too often. And I don't I've not really seen too
many people waiting for a taxi since we've been open for the past six months. Clapham
Junction's a six minute walk away so people are normally walking that way or getting on
busses and yeah we just kind of do our best to make sure people are leaving as promptly
as possible. Does that answer your question? Yes it does. Just on, so that leads into my
my second question, you mentioned the plastic cup point. So just be good. I know everybody always
tries their best to maintain cleanliness of areas and things happen, but just be good to get an
understanding of what measures you'll take just around the frontage of the business of how to
keep that clean. Of course, at the end of every single evening, we sweep outside the front, get
rid of the cigarette butts, make sure there's no broken glass, plastic cups, if there's anything
there we clean it up. It's bad for business and us as well. No one's going to want it.
We open at seven o 'clock the next morning. It's not going to look good on our side if
there's loads of plastic cups and cigarette butts outside the front of our shop. So it's
almost like a two way street. We want to clear up but we also don't want it to make ourselves
look like a messy business.
And is there, when you said that say people are leaving and they've still got drinks to
finish and you give them those plastic cups. Anything I explain to people once you've finished
your cup please put it away. Yeah of course, of course, yeah of course. Okay, I think that was
that those are all my questions that I had. So just open it up to I don't know, Councillor Lewis
with her. I just wanted to give everybody an opportunity to ask questions if you if
you have one or not. Don't feel pressured into it into one. Okay, in that case, thank
you very much for the applicant for applicants for addressing the committee. I will now move
to representations to have an opportunity to address the committee. So I have two down,
it's Miss Crewe and Miss MacPherson. So you've got up to 10 minutes. I don't know whether
you want to take five minutes each and happy either one of you to go first. And then I'll
say when the 10 minutes is up and then we can ask questions or the committee can ask
questions. So I don't know who would like to like to go first.
Morag, are you happy with me starting this off and then pass
over to you?
Yeah, absolutely Georgie, no problem.
Amazing. Thank you. So look, thanks for listening to
representations. And just want to say as well from the offset,
like Alfie, Liam have really made efforts to, like chat with
us all and be forthcoming. And it's evident that they want to
be good neighbours to us. So all of this comes from a really
friendly place but ultimately a lot of the proposals that have been put forward
are really concerning to a lot of the neighbours on the street and even the
suggestions that were sent through yesterday via email just don't really
come close to giving us the reassurances we need. If we start with addressing like
the opening hours. So at the moment it's open 7am till 11pm, which is most hours around
a clock. Literally all we get is the main hours of sleep without any potential risk
of disturbance. Obviously requesting a licence to go until 12 .30 is very concerning because
we've all lived along the street with Tapper Jacks who had that licence and to say it was
a nuisance, like wouldn't even cut it, we were suffering every single weekend with public
events, with private events. So we've seen already like what happens first hand and it's
all very well and good saying that Spruce doesn't intend to change its operating hours
but at any given time they could choose to without the neighbours having any opportunity
to have a say or object.
And so this is our opportunity, which is why everyone's so nervous about it.
Talking about private events as well, those were the ones that were the worst at Tappy
Jack's because it was typically big parties, lots of singing, lots of people screaming
outside.
Obviously, they've had to pay for venue hire usually, so the staff working there are less
keen to tell the birthday girl, sorry, you have to shut up.
Hearing as well from the Spruce team that most of their revenue comes from late in the
evening, to be honest, that just demonstrates the problem that the residents have.
We absolutely understand that you're thriving as a business and it's brilliant to see, but
But it does show that most of the disturbance comes for residents late at night, disproportionately.
And 11pm or 10pm on a weeknight might sound reasonable for a business, and I completely
understand it does.
But when you're lying in bed trying to sleep, or you're trying to get your baby down and
they've been woken up by someone singing happy birthday outside, or screaming in the streets,
it's very late and you are literally counting down the minutes until you can finally have
like guaranteed peace and quiet. And I completely understand that Alfie and Liam and the team
are like decent human beings and they're going to do everything they can. But really this
relies on the goodwill and manners of the general public, which doesn't exist when it's
late at night and people have had a bottle of wine.
And again, that's just from like experience.
This isn't hypothetical.
Then talking like about the music element as well.
The live music is a massive, massive concern.
With Tappy Jacks, they originally were a tapas bar.
So you would never think that it was gonna get really rowdy,
But because the licence allowed them to have live music, they then started doing live music
two nights at the weekend.
And it was a singer with a guitar inside, which was like encouraging everyone to sing
along.
Even though the policy was that the door and the windows should be closed to like the Councillors
point, the door was constantly being opened and closed by people going in and out.
like it was just never closed because people were constantly moving through the areas and the sound
it was it was as if we were in the bar like trying to sleep and also even if the music is only
inside people were still singing along outside and that's extremely hard for anyone to control
even if there's no speakers outside.
We did put in the request that if you're gonna have
any kind of live music, there needs to be a doorman,
like whose number one job it is to keep that door closed,
monitor outdoor areas and tell people to be quiet
if they're singing, because the proposal at the moment
is that the staff like working behind the bar would do that.
But if people have got a busy bar,
they're obviously going to be prioritising serving customers over monitoring, like constantly
monitoring the outdoor area. Because the response like it could only be responsive, it couldn't
be proactive, just stood there all the time telling people not to make noise. Then moving
on to the next piece is like around the capacity. So it says the max capacity is 80. We all
think we've seen more than 50 people just congregating outside, which again is a lovely
vibe until you're the neighbour who's not wanting to be held up late and everyone's
having fun outside your window. So even if the max capacity is 80, where are those people?
If there could be a max capacity of 10 people outside beyond reasonable hours, then perhaps
that would be fair but if all 80 of those people are able to be outside, guess where
they're going to be on a summer's day when the residents need their windows open because
it's boiling hot. This summer we weren't able to have our windows open at the front of the
house and it was just unbearable. The waste collection, again onto another point, is a
massive, massive issue. I'm really pleased to hear that you guys are going to address
that because we will sometimes put up with 10 minutes of glass bottles shattering at
3am, 4am. It's like actually pretty scary. To be honest, the first times you hear it,
it makes you jump out of your skin in the middle of the night. So I'd love to understand
if that's actually been agreed with the council and the bin men or whether that's just something
that's been proposed by Spruce.
So yeah, we wanna understand that.
So, Miss Crewe, I didn't want to interrupt you.
I just want to make sure that Miss McPherson also gets,
sometimes, about three minutes left.
Of course, I'm onto the last point,
which is just about the telephone number.
It's great that we've got that,
but we need to know what guaranteed response we have,
because anyone can text something,
and anyone can text something back
or not text something back.
Thank you. Morag, over to you.
Thank you. As I said, I'm a Neighbourhood Watch Coordinator for Harbert Road.
And you say about an external area, stroke, public, outside.
It is actually a public area. It's not owned by Spruce, as far as I'm aware.
And if it is, could you please send me clarification?
My huge concern is the crime of disorder.
St. John's Hill is a residential area and not a commercial area.
And we have a lot of commercial at Clapham Junction.
Six minutes away was the quote.
Perfect.
I believe the granting and extended licence and the consumption of alcohol would greatly increase potential public nuisance crime disorder through arguments, fights and drunkenness.
and potentially stroke, maybe drug abuse, but that's, I don't know.
I think it's not acceptable.
The extended hours, I think it would result in a public nuisance,
and we already have huge problems with crime, petty crime.
and sorry, Alfie and Liam, I think you're doing a sterling job and you know you have been trying to accommodate
but I do believe that your extending hours is not acceptable for such a small residential area
and those are my concerns as a neighbourhood watch coordinator.
crime, disorder, drug abuse, drunkenness. And we have a very, very low crime rate here.
It's a residential area, a very low crime rate. And I appreciate that, Alfie and Liam,
there's very little you can do about that because you're not doing it. However, people
behave, people behave very differently when they've been drinking.
And already throughout the summer,
I have seen mothers with buggies or prams, whatever you call them,
trying to get home.
And the people who have been spruce aren't even
allowing them to get through.
Normally you would stand by and allow a woman with a,
with a, with a child to pass.
your clientele is young and that's the nature of what it is.
But I believe because they are young, St. John's Hill will end up having a higher crime rate.
So, Ms McPherson, that's time now. So we'll do is hand over to the committee for any questions
to representations. I'll probably use Chair's privilege to ask the first one. This is of
Ms Hopkins. I probably should have asked you at the start on your agenda item, but just
to cheque, have there been any formal complaints come through in terms of noise complaints?
Does it just be good to understand them?
At this moment, no.
No, I can double cheque now the system, but I'm not aware of it.
Otherwise, noise would have mentioned that.
Okay, thank you.
In that case, happy to hand over Councillor Lewis, Councillor Ahmad, if you have any questions
for the representations.
answer those. I suppose I could just follow on with your question actually Councillor
Minton and ask whether anybody knows if there have been any formal complaints about increased
crime in the area and anti -social behaviour, increased anti -social behaviour in the area?
It was just, you know, I thought it was a lovely question.
Mr Bishop, you're on mute.
I am on mute, sorry about that.
We're getting perilously close to introducing new evidence, so I think we need to be a little
bit careful there.
Councillor Armat, do you have any questions?
I think the residents have just tell us the concerns what they have.
Probably we can take those concerns.
I think some of them are really serious as their past experience with the other owner
was not very good. Thank you.
Okay, in that case, I would move on. So thank you, I should say to those making representations,
appreciate you attending this evening to make those. We'll now move on to closing remarks. So
both the representations and the applicant will have up to two minutes to make any closing
remarks. The representations will go first. So Ms McPherson, Ms Crewe, I don't know whether
you wanted to take one minute each, but totally up to you.
I would like for the request for late hours and music to be denied, please.
Yes, same. We're obviously looking for it to be denied. If it's not denied, we're looking
for some much stronger conditions than have been proposed.
Okay, then no more closing remarks. I'll hand over to the applicant. Any closing remarks?
Thank you very much, Chair. I don't want to discount what the residents have said. It's clear that they've got concerns and it's also very clear that they didn't have a good time with the previous operators, but I don't want that to leak into making a judgement of Alfie and Liam before they've properly had the opportunity to demonstrate what it is that they can do.
What I'm hopeful of is the fact that first and foremost,
the hours that we've applied for,
one that they were there before,
so the council's deemed them appropriate before.
You've just heard that there haven't been
any substantiated complaints
in relation to the premises at all.
And it has been operating under temporary event notices
for a period of time now.
There's also, I'm told, three pubs within 50 metres
of Spruce that operate until one.
So I'm slightly concerned about the inference
that it may be just spruces customers when we don't actually know that. However, with all of
that said, what I will say is hopefully you take some comfort from the fact that one, not only have
we replicated the conditions that were in Tapper Jacks' operating schedule to go with those hours,
we've also, despite the fact that we don't have environmental health making a representation,
engaged with them and sought to agree conditions along the lines of what they've requested.
Ultimately, I would suggest if this were a real problem in terms of noise from their perspective
that they would be in the room with us and we'd be taking advice from them. You've heard that the
police have withdrawn their representation so again there's no evidence that they feel that
the grant of this application would undermine the crime and disorder licencing objective.
Under then chair you've seen in the correspondence that I've sent to residents there are some fairly
stringent conditions in there for an 80 capacity all day into the evening venue. There will be a
direct line, there'll be a direct contact number. I think what I want to end on is this, you've met
Alfie and Liam this evening, this is a two -man venture.
They employ 17 staff.
They're fairly young, not that that makes a difference,
but they're trying to take a chance and to do something
that will ultimately benefit the community.
It wouldn't be in their interest to operate this
in a way that doesn't cooperate with the neighbours
and in a way that disturbs them.
Ultimately, if they do that, we'll be back before you.
They'll be dealing with enforcement action.
They might be dealing with a review
and we'd be sat before you again.
and it just makes no sense for them to take that risk. So I'm hopeful, Chair, that on the basis of
what you've heard, that you're able to grant the applications we'd applied for with the conditions
that we've suggested. Thank you. Fantastic. Thank you. That now concludes this part of the meeting.
The decision reasons and any legal guidance given during this subcommittee's discussion,
Inform the decision will be confirmed in writing together with information about any rights
of appeal. That will all be within five working days. Just to say thank you to both the applicants
and those making representations this evening for joining. Members of the licencing subcommittee,
Democratic Services Officer and Legal Advisor, we will now join the separate confidential
meeting room to make a decision. Thank you, everybody.
Have a good evening. Thank you. Thanks very much. Thanks guys. Thank you.