They will spend £300,000 on the re-fit,
which will include removing the black paint and reverting to the Royal
Standard name.
The police asked for a further three
months’ complete suspension (LuXe asked for only two months) for the
re-fit and staff training.
The panel decided on three months from
now, which will mean peace and quiet for residents over the summer
months.
Use of the terrace - the licensing
panel agreed to my plea for the alcohol licence to match their planning
permission (no customer use at any time).
They will be allowed to have
“incidental background music” – the legal requirement is for customers
to be able to hold a normal conversation over it. Any live music must
finish by 11pm.
I expressed concern over the future use
of TENS (which allow later closing on a one-off basis, and which the
Council and/or the police can object to, but which don’t allow for any
public involvement).
Many residents will be very
disappointed that LuXe wasn’t closed down completely. However, once the
police had agreed to their gastro-pub proposal, the way the (national)
legislation is drafted meant there was no possibility of this
happening. So the Panel’s decision to bring forward the closing time on
Sunday - Thursday to 11.30pm from LuXe’s original proposal of midnight
(as agreed by the police), and getting confirmation about the terrace,
are considerable improvements.
I am sure that the large number of
objections which residents sent in to the Council played a great part
in persuading LuXe’s management that radical changes were needed. In
addition, these objections, and the strong personal testimony of the
residents who spoke at the hearing, meant the Licensing Panel were
persuaded to take a firm line.
Obviously, residents and the Plans
Group will be monitoring what happens when the premises re-open –
another review can be requested if problems reoccur.
When we looked at the situation in
Loughton last November, there appeared to be no practical way of
preventing Nu-Bar, LuXe and fifteen (York Hill) from carrying on as
early-morning licensed venues - we have come a very long way in the
right direction!
David
Linnell, LRA Plans Group | | Why
didn’t the Council just close them down?
I’ve had an email
from a resident who thought the Council should have shut down LuXe
completely!
If only it were that easy.
The Council are
bound to apply the national legislation, which we (and our colleagues
in the
National Association of Residents Associations) have campaigned against
vigorously.
Basically the
national legislation favours the licensees. If the police – as they did
– say
that they think the new proposals are satisfactory then, had the
Council
completely removed the licence, LuXe would have appealed and would have
won
(probably with costs against the Council).
It can be
immensely frustrating for Cllrs to take part in these reviews on this
basis,
but they have to act in a quasi-judicial way and follow the
legislation.
Unusually, the Panel went further than the agreement with the police by
reducing the opening hours Sunday – Thursday, and firmly banning any
use of the
terrace by customers.
The residents who
attended the meeting spoke from the heart, and expressed the
frustration – and
rage – felt by residents in general. So I expected people to feel that
the
managers of LuXe had “got away with it”. All I can say, from my
experience of
these cases is that, given the police’s attitude, we did better than I
could
have expected.
Another problem
stemming from the national level is that the planning legislation and
the
licensing situation operate completely separately. However, this can
also work
to residents’ advantage, in that there are venues in the town which the
Council
has had to grant alcohol licences to, to after midnight, but where the
planning
permission for the premises limits opening to midnight at the latest.
(There
are moves to combine the two sets of legislation, but the danger would
be that
the weaker approach of the two is adopted, rather than the stronger.)
As to penalties,
there may be a slight consolation in noting that they are having to
raise
£300,000 to re-fit the premises, and are losing 4 months income
(they’ve been
closed for a month, and have to stay closed for another three, not two
as they
asked for), and are facing a doubtful future – is there enough business
in the
High Road for yet another restaurant business?
If, when they
re-open, residents start to suffer problems again, we will be ready to
help
organise another review of the licence – but I live in hope that we
won’t have
to.
David
Linnell,
LRA Plans Group |
14 October 2017
1
June 2017 
25
September 2016