Agenda and draft minutes

Councillor Heather Staff welcomed everyone to the meeting and officers and members introduced themselves.  The procedure for the conduct of the meeting was outlined.

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Phil Graham and Marian Spall.

Councillor Heather Staff substituted for Councillor Phil Graham and Councillor Ben Mackmurdie.

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.

The Licensing Officer reported there was no additional information since the publication of the report.

The police stated that this was an application for the extension of hours in possibly the most challenging and busiest areas in Islington which was already saturated. The area was bordered by Camden and Hackney. The application was weak for a premises that wanted to have hours beyond framework hours. The applicant was also the licensee for the next-door premises and in June 2023 the police had been called to the next-door premises, as unruly customers had made threats to staff. There was then a further incident in June when staff were threatened.  CCTV was requested but it was not working. In July there was a more serious altercation where a staff member hit a customer with a metal bar. The CCTV had still not been repaired at this time.  The licensee was invited to an officer panel. The police did not consider that the applicant had demonstrated that he could make improvements and he therefore did not consider that an extension to the licence should be granted.

In response to questions, it was noted that one of the major stumbling blocks to an arrest was the lack of CCTV. Neither party wished to substantiate any charges and the victim had been removed from the area. The area was saturated with venues with late hours and the police did not consider that this application warranted an exception. It was noted that there had been no issues relating to this premises.

The Licensing Authority reiterated that the area was an extremely busy hub. The application was for a late-night food premises with a nightclub opposite on the Camden side of the road. She expected applicants to demonstrate how they would manage the premises with regard to the licensing objectives in their operating schedule.  She considered their application to be very sparse and the applicant had not demonstrated how they would operate the premises in an extremely busy area and outside framework hours.

The applicant’s representative stated that this was an application to vary a premises licence. The applicant had operated the kebab shop next door for fourteen years until 5am. This premises became available, so he had taken on the premises to offer different cuisine.  It was noted that the hours were beyond framework hours outlined in licensing policy 6, they had regard to the Kings Cross cumulative impact area and accepted the onus was on the applicant to rebut the presumption. He considered that the premises could be a possible exception as it was not alcohol led and it would have an experienced operator who had operated the premises next door until the early hours of the morning. There was a McDonalds along the road which operated 24 hours and a KFC opposite. He did not consider that he would be bringing trade into the area but was tapping into the trade that was already there and it was not a destination in its own  ...  view the full minutes text for item 60.

The Sub-Committee noted that this item had been withdrawn as there was agreement between all parties.