News from Peterborough City Council

Peterborough City Council's Licensing Act 2003 sub-committee has revoked the premises licence for a shop on Westgate, Peterborough, after Cambridgeshire Constabulary requested for it to be reviewed.

 

The sub-committee met yesterday (Monday 28 July) to review the licence for Smilte and decided it should be revoked.

 

A review was requested by Cambridgeshire Constabulary after a test purchasing exercise in the city centre on 7 March 2008.

 

Further investigations revealed that no written training records or procedures regarding age restrictive products were in place at the time of the test purchase.

 

Licence holder and designated premises supervisor Dangira Jankauskaite said training regarding age restrictive products would be implemented. A follow-up visit to the premises by city council licensing enforcement officers found that training records and a register of incidents where sales of alcohol had been refused were insufficient.

 

Terri Martin, Peterborough City Council's licensing enforcement officer, said: "We hope the revoking of the licence of a city centre shop will remind all alcohol retailers in Peterborough of the need to ensure they put in place an adequate level of staff training to prevent any sales of alcohol to persons under the age of 18 and the potential consequences if they do not.

 

"We would recommend retailers adopt the 'Challenge 21' policy, where any person who wishes to purchase alcohol and is lucky enough to look under the age of 21 is challenged to prove that they are aged 18 or over. This, together with adequate staff training will hopefully reduce the amount of underage sales and the chances of premises having their licences suspended or revoked.

 

"Working with our partners Cambridgeshire Constabulary through the Peterborough Evening Partnership we will be offering an 'Age restricted sales business information pack' to all premises throughout Peterborough who have products that are subject to age restrictions, such as alcohol, knives and petrol. This package will be available soon."