Agenda and draft minutes

There were no apologies for absence.

The Chair will consider the admission of any late reports, related to item 5 below, which will be considered under that agenda item.  

None received.

A member with a personal interest in a matter who attends a meeting of the authority at which the matter is considered must disclose to that meeting the existence and nature of that interest at he commencement of that consideration, or when the interest becomes apparent.

A member with a personal interest in a matter also has a prejudicial interest in that matter if the interest is one which a member of the public with knowledge of the relevant facts would reasonably regard as so significant that it is likely to prejudice the member’s judgement of the public interest and if this interest affects their financial position or the financial position of a person or body as described in paragraph 8 of the Code of Conduct and/or if it relates to the determining of any approval, consent, licence, permission or registration in relation to them or any person or body described in paragraph 8 of the Code of Conduct.

There were no declarations of interest.

The Chair will explain the procedure that the Committee will follow for the hearing considered under the Gambling Act 2005.  A copy of the procedure is attached.

Noted.

To consider an application to provide the provision of facilities for betting, whether by making or accepting bets, by acting as a betting intermediary, or by providing other facilities for the making or accepting of bets (a “betting premises licence”).

Please note that it being a special meeting of the Sub Committee, under Part 4, Section B, Paragraph 17 of the Council’s Constitution, no other business shall be considered at the meeting.

The Special Licensing Sub Committee A (the Committee) was asked to consider an application to provide facilities for betting, acting as a betting intermediary or by providing other facilities for the making or accepting of  bets.

The Licensing Officer presented the report and outlined the purpose, principles to be applied and recommendations.  The Officer advised the Committee of the background to the application as detailed in points 5.0 – 5.5 of the report.  At section 6.0 the Committee was informed that there were no comments from the responsible authorities, however there had been a number of representations from interested parties.  On pages 9-10 of the report the Officer explained a number of the mandatory and default conditions attached to every licence.   The representations received from interested parties included the make up of the area in terms of the close proximity to a high number of vulnerable people and the mental hospital was close the to premises.

The Committee received a number of tabled documents and the officer explained who had submitted each of the documents.  The applicants representative also tabled a further file of documents which the objectors had agreed could be submitted.

The Committee queried the number of betting shops in Green Lanes and the Licensing Officer responded that there were currently five betting establishments.  

The applicant’s representative presented their case and advised the Committee that a great deal of reference had been made in the documents submitted to previous gambling application decisions.  Any decision should be made on the merits of this application and whether Better had procedures in place against the criteria.  The representative explained that the most distinguished feature of this application was that it replaced the licence granted by the Crown Court on 24 August 2007.  The judgement was based on the higher standards of Better in order to make their competition address their policies.  Therefore the representative was asking the Committee to replace the licence previously granted.

The applicant’s represented posed several questions to Mr Bedford representative of Better.  He requested Mr Bedford to give a brief history of the company.  Mr Bedford explained that he had knowledge of the Green Lanes area and had been involved with the current premises for the last eighteen months.  He advised that the company had 32 licenses, 23 trading shops and 9 in various stages of fitting.  The average cost to fit out a shop was £275k. 

Mr Bedford further stated that the incidents raised in some of the representations would not happen in Better shops.  Better had researched into the local area, had a good working relationship with the community police and attended community meetings.  The applicant’s representative questioned Mr Bedford on a number of scenarios which could happen in a betting shop and asked how Better would deal with them.  In response Mr Bedford stated that customers would be barred from the shop and that all Better shops had two members of staff on duty at all times who were trained to deal with such  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.