Agenda and minutes

Councillor Flora Williamson welcomed everyone to the meeting and officers and members introduced themselves.  The procedure for the conduct of the meeting was outlined. Members of the public present were informed that the hearing was to be filmed.

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Ward and Safi Ngongo.

Councillor Poole substituted for Councillor Safi Ngongo and Councillor Shaikh substituted for Councillor Ward.

If you have a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest* in an item of business:

§  if it is not yet on the council’s register, you must declare both the existence and details of it at the start of the meeting or when it becomes apparent;

§  you may choose to declare a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest that is already in the register in the interests of openness and transparency. 

In both the above cases, you must leave the room without participating in discussion of the item.

If you have a personal interest in an item of business and you intend to speak or vote on the item you must declare both the existence and details of it at the start of the meeting or when it becomes apparent but you may participate in the discussion and vote on the item.

*(a)     Employment, etc - Any employment, office, trade, profession or vocation carried on for profit or gain.

(b) Sponsorship - Any payment or other financial benefit in respect of your expenses in carrying out duties as a member, or of your election; including from a trade union.

(c) Contracts - Any current contract for goods, services or works, between you or your partner (or a body in which one of you has a beneficial interest) and the council.

(d) Land - Any beneficial interest in land which is within the council’s area.

(e) Licences- Any licence to occupy land in the council’s area for a month or longer.

(f) Corporate tenancies - Any tenancy between the council and a body in which you or your partner have a beneficial interest.

 (g) Securities - Any beneficial interest in securities of a body which has a place of business or land in the council’s area, if the total nominal value of the securities exceeds £25,000 or one hundredth of the total issued share capital of that body or of any one class of its issued share capital. 

This applies to all members present at the meeting.

There were no declarations of interest.  

The order of business would be as the agenda.

In response to a question from the legal officer, the applicant’s representative agreed that the interim steps remained in place pending an appeal hearing if the licence was modified or if the licence was revoked.

The licensing officer reported that all additional papers from Fabric had been circulated as a second despatch agenda.

The police representative reported that this main review hearing followed the recent summary review, submitted following the deaths of two 18 year olds at the nightclub, within a period of 6 weeks.  The two 18 year olds were in possession of Class A drugs and were able to enter the premises, consume and purchase additional drugs in the premises. It was considered that a serious breach of conditions and the operation at the premises had helped to create an environment that was tolerant of serious crime. 

The Sub-Committee moved into private session at 6.45 pm to hear further evidence from the police under Schedule 12a of the Local Government Act 1972 under Category 1, Category 2 and Category 7.

When returning to open session the police representative continued with the evidence.  It was stated that a visit had been carried out on 2^nd/3rd July 2016 over the Saturday evening/Sunday morning.  At page 71 of the agenda, there was a statement which noted that there had been a lack of compliance with the search policy and an open ability to purchase Class A drugs in the premises.  Customers were seen taken drugs visibly within distance of the bar and there was evidence of drug taking in the toilets.  Staff were seen within earshot of drugs being sold. There was evidence that the door staff were static.  It was also stated that officers on the visit were searched for less than five seconds.  These were statements which were consistent with those in the exempt papers. There was evidence of breaches of conditions 2, 9 and 35.  Page 95 of the agenda papers referred to a police visit on the 22 July where a customer in the chill out area was in a state of undress and was highly intoxicated and this had not been acted upon by staff.  This was evidence across a range of recent dates which signified beaches of conditions 9 and 35 and indicated an ease of access to drugs and consumption of drugs being open and frequent and which created an environment that was tolerant of drugs and serious crime. No denial of this evidence had been put forward by Fabric.  There had been six drug related deaths between January 2012 and August 2016.  The death in September 2014 had the same consistent theme as the more recent deaths at referred to at page 173.  At the 2/3 July visit the internal security staff remained static rather than moving throughout the venue and the full search procedure had not taken place.

There had been a review of the premises licence in 2014 due to a number of deaths and also 8 collapses at  ...  view the full minutes text for item 131.

RESOLVED

That the press and public be excluded during consideration of the following item as the presence of members of the public and press would result in the disclosure of exempt information within the terms of the Local Government Acct 1972 for the reasons indicated.

Premises Licence Review – Fabric 77a Charterhouse Street, EC1

Category 1 – Information relating to any individual.

Category 2 – Information which is likely to reveal the identity of an individual

Category 7 – Information relating to any action taken or to be taken in connection with the prevention, investigation or prosecution of crime.