Agenda item - Chair's Communications

            Extended Covid Restrictions

3.1      The Chair, Councillor Deane stated that she wanted to start her communications by referring to the effects of the extended Covid restrictions, hospitality remained in step 3 with social distancing requirements and night clubs remaining closed. She understood that both police and council licensing teams were seeing experiencing fewer issues and fielding fewer enquiries from licensed premises with this latest re-opening stage of the road map and business as usual, in terms of applications, it was busy so hopefully there was positivity out there.

3.2      In July 2020, the Government had introduced through the Business and Planning Act 2020 a Fast Track process to allow businesses selling food or drink to obtain authorisation from the Local Authority for the placement of furniture such as tables and chairs on a highway adjacent to their premises, a “Pavement Licence”. Highways had confirmed that they were still using the Business and Planning Act to issue pavement licences and that they were waiving all fees for these licences. The Act was due to expire on 30 September 2021, all licences issued would expire at that time. There were are proposals however to extend the expiry time till September 2022.

3.3      The council currently had over 300 pavement licences in place and expected this to increase as lockdown and the summer approached this was approximately the same number of licences as before the pandemic but some premises now had larger areas. The council was continuing to support businesses who wished to make use of a pavement licence. But the changes had not been welcomed by everyone. The reopening of businesses and the reliance on outside spaces had caused some concerns and enforcement issues, whilst most businesses had abided by the guidelines and licence conditions we had also seen an increase in licence breaches. Mainly this was around areas spreading either because the owners were adding extra seats or customers are moving them to create more space. Because some areas had been enlarged there was not as much room on the pavement to accommodate any spread and this had lead to obstructions and complaints. A number of complaints and comments had also been received regarding the experimental traffic order and subsequent area changes in the North Laine. Data was being gathered including traffic counts and stakeholder comments in advance of presenting a report to a future ETS committee.

3.4      The Highway Enforcement team would be taking on more staff over the summer to help tackle these issues and was also planning on reviewing its highway licensing policy towards the end of the year. Finally, the Chair informed Members that a training session had been arranged for them on 5 July ordinarily this would be for all members of the Licensing Committee and was particularly aimed at the new members whom she had welcomed earlier, however this had been extended to all councillors throughout the city irrespective of whether they were on Licensing Committee or not, as this would help them to understand the Licensing Policy and licensing objectives so that if there were licence applications in their area and residents were not happy, they knew how to make a representation and how to make a presentation at a panel hearing. Members of the Committee were urged members of their Group who weren’t on Licensing Committee to attend.

3.5      RESOLVED – That the contents of the Chair’s Communications be noted and received.